


(You Want To) Make A Memory

by Kileykao



Category: Critical Role (Web Series) RPF
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Soulmate-Identifying Marks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-08
Updated: 2019-09-08
Packaged: 2020-10-12 07:40:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 25,535
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20560658
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kileykao/pseuds/Kileykao
Summary: Sam Riegel and Liam O'Brien aren't soulmates. They shouldn't get to live happily ever after.They'll figure themselves out eventually.





	(You Want To) Make A Memory

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tambuli](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tambuli/gifts).

> This whole thing started at 2 am back in June with a clip of video of Sam and Liam in an anime from before they met. This ended up being way longer than I thought it would be, but to fair what doesn't even up being longer than I planned
> 
> Oh Also Happy Birthday to the person who started this whole Alternate Universe.

They meet as young twenty somethings on a panel at a convention in New York City in 2002. They're both young actors who are still trying to make it, both with only a handful of credits to their names. Both of them not quite full time voice actors yet, still trying to stick with their dreams of working on Broadway. The two of them are sat down next to each other on panel by pure luck, chance, and the fact that alphabetically it worked.  
They're sitting with a group of people more talented, more well known than they are for voice acting then them, and knowing that a grave majority all of the fans filling into the conference room aren’t there to see them.

The first thing that Sam Riegel says to Liam O’Brien is “Having a good weekend so far?”

And Liam O’Brien replies “Busy. But yeah, it’s been fun so far,”

Those aren’t the words that they have had pressed into their skin from the day they were born. They know from their first seconds of knowing each other that they’re not soulmates. They have their own words plain as day showing on their skin, presented for the world to see. Sam’s words written in deep black ink scrawled across his forearm, and Liam’s royal purple words written hastily across his collarbone.

Their first words to each other aren’t the words of “Hey, you, what are you doing here?” written across Sam’s forearm in a rich black ink.  
It isn’t the words that read "Uh, Nothing?" written across Liam’s collarbone in a deep royal purple.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates. That’s easy for them to understand. They don’t share words. They aren’t meant to be.

There is no mistaking that.  
They know they aren’t meant to be seconds after meeting

But there is something about their first conversation that was special. The first one between two men who are bound to have a million more together is one of the easiest conversations that either of them have ever had.

While it starts off as just awkward small talk between two people who do vaguely the same thing for work, and don’t know anything about each other besides what’s been said. It still feels natural to be talking to one another. It still instantly feels like they’ve known each other their entire lives. It’s easy for them to hold a conversation about nothing and everything for the fifteen minutes before their panel starts.

At some point, the panel starts and they sit together for the first time side by side answering questions. The panel is short, just them mostly listening in while the panels answers fans questions about various projects they’ve been working on recently, and even that time together was easy.

It ends with them pulling each other aside afterwards. A sharpie in hand and a promise to get drinks soon.

“We Should be Best Friends”  
One of them says it to the other. Fifteen years later, it’s hard for them to remember which one of them say it first. Liam swears up and down it was Sam who had said it first, and Sam is positive that it was Liam. The two of them aren’t soulmates, so they became best friends instead.

(Sam leaves the convention that night with Liam’s phone number written in sharpie alongside his words on his forearm. The numbers inked into his skin with a promise of something more)

*

It’s surprisingly easy for them to be best friends with each other.  
In fact it’s the easiest friendship that either of them have ever had. It’s easy for them to fall into one another on a couch, pressing their thighs together while eating cheap take out, and talking about their days with the television quietly playing in the background half forgotten. It’s easy for Liam to tell Sam things that he doesn’t tell to anyone else, and it’s easy for Sam to just  
with Liam. A mask that he sometimes forgets he wears falling away and leaving just him behind.

It’s easy for them not to pretend to be something else, someone else and leave just be them.

Because of that, it’s also incredibly easy for people to assume that they're soulmates sometimes.

It’s easy for Sam to wrap his arms around Liam’s neck, and duck his head to his ear to whisper their conversations into his ear, just for the shorter man to hear. It’s easy for Liam to pull Sam through the corner store handing him groceries as they go, and talking about his day as Sam follows behind humming along Liam’s stories. It’s easy for Sam to pull Liam down into his lap when they're just on the right side of tipsy, laughing into his hair, and claim him for cuddles. It’s easy for Liam to fold himself into Sam’s chest laughing at his jokes, and listening to the vibrations of the younger man’s chest as he hums along to the faint music that fills whoever’s apartment they're in that night.

Sometimes it’s easy for them to pretend to be soulmates too.

The first time they pretend to be soulmates (on purpose) is two months after they met on a panel at Big Apple Anime Fest in a dive bar in New York City. It’s the first time Sam, without even thinking drags Liam away from a girl that was hitting on him with claims of wanting his soulmate back.

Liam had been leaning against the bar across the room, waiting for the bartender to make their drinks. The two of them both were dressed for where they were: both in well worn jeans that were just a bit too tight, Sam in a t-shirt that Liam referred to as painted on, and Liam wearing a dark black leather jacket. They were both a fair number of drinks into the night, and weren’t quite ready to leave for the night yet either.

The girl who walks up to Liam with a drink in her hand has loose curls in her hair, and is in a dress way too nice for the bar they're currently in. Her dress shimmering under the dim, nearly burned out lights and swaying along to the music filling in the atmosphere of the bar. She’s smiling at Liam, and laughing at whatever he’s saying to her.

Even from across the room Sam can tell that he’s uncomfortable.

He takes a step towards the two of them before he even realizes that he’s stood up from the table. He takes another step, then another. Then suddenly he’s across the bar and his arm wraps around Liam’s waist, pressing his chest to Liam’s back. The smile the girl gives to him is one that isn’t exactly something he’d call pleasant.

“Have you gotten our drinks yet Honey?” Sam whispers pitched just loud enough for the girl to hear. Liam sags in his grip, leaning back heavily into his embrace. The deep breath that he lets out let’s Sam know that Liam is relieved to be rescued from the conversation, and that this was the right call to make.

Liam turns his head so that the two of them are sharing breaths with one another, and in the split second that their eyes meet the older man makes a decision. He looked back to the woman and he said “This is my soulmate Sam,”

They both knew that him saying that would end the conversation, and they were both right, because not even thirty seconds later the woman excuses herself and heads back to her group of friends.

What Sam doesn’t expect is for him to like that idea.

It’s a feeling that washes over him that split second of bliss, that the warmth of Liam pressed into him could be a real feeling. Not just something fabricated to scare away unwanted attention.

They’re not soulmates. They aren’t each other’s story book ending.

Their first words aren’t written across each others skin. The two of them aren’t meant to be like this. But that idea, the idea of being soulmates, when it’s put into their heads for the first time in a run down dive bar in Manhattan is not something that ever really leaves their mind.

Because really? That doesn’t sound so bad.

It's the first time that they call each other soulmates on purpose. It’s not the last. It’s not even the last time that Sam would roll up to Liam, wrapping his arms around him, pulling him into a protective and claiming embrace and introducing himself as Liam’s soulmate to save him from an unwanted conversation.

They’re not soulmates. But sometimes it’s nice to pretend, even if it is just for a second.

*

They’ve known each other for six months when Liam brings up wanting to move out to California. They’ve known each other for six months, when Sam tells Liam that he’s been thinking about doing the same.

Los Angeles is a logical choice for both of them. There is a bigger need for voice actors and voice directors out west, and there would be a bigger shot for work out there.

It makes sense to head out west.  
It also makes sense to get an apartment together.

But the thing is, they don’t really talk about it. Sure they talk about moving to Los Angeles in general. Sure they talk about the logistics of how they’re going to get there. Sure they talk about what type of apartment they want and what they think they can afford. Sure they tell their parents and their sisters that they're thinking about leaving and that they have plans to head out west.  
But they don’t really talk about the fact that they're looking into sharing an apartment.

It’s easier, one of them had said. All these years later and much like many things, the schematics of who said it first escapes their memories. They both don’t know anyone in Los Angeles, and they're two mostly broke actors, still trying to find their way in the world of voice acting. It makes sense for them to share a place. It’s cheaper, and will save them money in the long run.  
(They spend all their free time together as it is anyway.)

It just makes sense for them to share an apartment.

The two of them spend their first couple of days in Los Angeles in a hotel, sharing a bed because a room with two beds is more expensive and they don’t mind crashing together, and jumping from apartment complex to apartment complex looking for something in their price range.

It takes them three days to sign a lease, and they are handed the keys fifteen minutes later.

Their first apartment that they share together has two bedrooms, and isn’t much bigger than a shoebox. Both of the bedrooms can barely fit a bed, the couch in the living room is well worn, the ugliest shade of green, cost them fifty bucks at most, and as Liam would say, well loved.

The nicest thing in whole tiny apartment is the television set up on the floor of the living room with two gaming consoles plugged into it and stacked on the floor next to the television. All things considered it’s a bad apartment in a bad part of town.  
Later, they’ll both think back fondly about that apartment, but that doesn’t stop them from hating everything about that apartment from day one of them living there.

Neither of them expected it to be easy to live together. For them, anytime they’ve shared a space together with anyone in the past, it's been a clusterfuck of two people clashing over the space. It’s also been elbows banging together as they pass each other in the kitchen, and fighting over the television.  
For the two of them though, just as most things that come to them, it’s easy. It’s seamlessly cooking food together in a too small kitchen passing by one another without crashing into each other. It’s watching shitty late night television on an old shitty television with Liam’s feet in Sam’s lap while eating even worse takeout.

It’s a seamless transition into being friends who occasionally crash at the other’s place to it being the two of them sharing a space. It’s not just seamless, it’s almost flawless. They also find that they agree with each other on most things. Whether it’s what to watch on Television, or what food to buy from the grocery store, or what kind of furniture they should buy for their apartment. They agree easily.

(They also get to see each other more, which is just one of the many bonuses of this arrangement.)

It’s just like everything they’ve ever heard about what soulmates are supposed to be. Soulmates are meant to be seamless. Soulmates are meant to be perfect together. Work perfectly with each other.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien are not soulmates.  
They know this. It’s not something they could have missed.

But they work just as well as any soulmates they’ve ever met. In fact, they work better together in some ways than some soulmates pairs they have met.

They don’t share words. They’re not soulmates.

But that doesn’t stop people from thinking they are. That doesn’t stop them from occasionally saying that they are.

*

They’ve been living in LA two months when they have a sudden realization that neither of them have slept with anyone in months. The only reason that they even realize that is one of their newer work friends is talking about how he hasn’t had sex in like a month. It’s like a punch in the gut when they realize that it’s been longer for them. Probably at least three or four for them. They definitely haven’t had sex since moving to LA, and maybe not for a month or so before leaving New York.

It’s been a while for both of them, and when they get back to their apartment that night, one of them says “What if we just slept with each other, you know, we’re both in a dry spell, and we can help each other out?”

They pretend to not remember who said that. But that’s one of the few that they both remember all these years later, clear as day.

It was Liam.

It was Liam, who when Sam agreed that it could work for him, crashed into Sam. Pulling him down into a kiss, his hands fisted into Sam’s shirt.

They’re not soulmates, but that terrible kiss with too much teeth, a bit too eager on both sides, is the start of something more. It’s not by any means the best kiss that either of them have ever had, or ever will have. It’s not the worst either. But it’s their first kiss.  
It’s fireworks and chemistry.

They’re not soulmates, but it’s easy for Sam to pull Liam towards his bedroom, their lips still connected and both of them pulling at each other’s clothes looking for skin. It’s easy for Sam to whisper into Liam’s mouth, “Are you sure you want to do this?”

Both of them have thoughts about how their friendship could suffer from this. How the two of them could lose the easiest that this friendship they’ve ever had and it’s a scary thought. They want this friendship, this one of a kind friendship, more than they want someone to say their word, or a partner or even sex.  
They want this special bond with each other to last a lifetime. They don’t want to ruin what they have.

They’re not soulmates, but it’s easy for Liam to push Sam down into the dark sheets of the younger man’s bed, and climb on top of him so he’s straddling Sam’s waist. Then he presses his lips back down to Sam’s, his hand still fisted into the younger man's shirt, grinding their hips together to an unheard melody.

They’re not soulmates. They know this. Even if they do start whatever this going to end up being, it’s no matter what, no matter if they want this, it’s destined to fail. They don’t get the choice of falling in love with one another or whether or not this relationship will be any more than just a one night thing.

But it’s still easy for Liam to drag Sam up into another kiss, and whisper back that he’s sure. That it’s worth the risk.

It’s easy for Liam to slowly take apart Sam, pressing the younger man in the sheets of one of their beds. It’s easy to pull at each other clothes until their naked, and pressed skin to skin.

It’s easy for Sam to curl his fingers into Liam’s hair, holding the older man’s head as he slowly wraps his mouth around his cock. It’s easy for Sam to moan Liam’s name as the older man swallows him to the base. Sam can easily guide his head up and down on his cock, and tell Liam how good he is at sucking him off breathlessly in the darkness of their apartment. It’s easy to come down Liam’s throat, moaning his name through the whole thing.

It’s easy for Sam to flip them over so he’s pinning Liam down into the sheets, and wrap his hand around Liam’s cock and slowly pump his dick until he was writhing underneath him. It’s easy for both of them to groan out each other’s names as Liam’s come spreads between them.

It’s easy for them to say it’s a one time thing with the two of them spread out skin to skin in one of their beds, both of them spent and high on each other. It’s easy for them to say to each other that it was a one time thing, before pressing another kiss to their lips, and starting the process anew.

(Later, it’s easy for Liam to whisper into Sam’s mouth asking if he wants to learn how to suck dick. Later it’s also easy for Sam to whisper into Liam’s thigh questions of how his performance was.)

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates, but it’s easy to become best friends with occasional benefits.

*

Time passes like that: the two of them in a constant circle of telling each other that the sex that they have is a one time thing and that this is the last time before inevitably falling right back into bed with one another. Time passes like that with them taking jobs and getting offered more jobs. The two of them slowly getting more regular jobs as both voice actors, script adaptors, and voice directors.

People don’t stop assuming that they’re soulmates. In fact, more people assume that they are than assume they’re not. Sam still rescues Liam from unwanted conversation, by wrapping his arms around his waist and introducing himself as the Jersey native’s soulmate. Sometimes they correct people, but mostly they let people assume what they will without any corrections.

They let the teenage girl who works at the corner store down the street and always makes comments about how she hopes her and her soulmate have a relationship just as good as theirs go on in thinking that they’re soulmates. It’s easier to let the young woman hope.

The two of them let people go on assuming that they are. They don’t talk about the fact that they don’t correct people. In all honesty they should correct people; they know that they should. It doesn’t change the fact that they don’t.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates. But the more time together, the more time they spend living together, the more that they start wishing that they were.

They don’t talk about that either.

It’s easier for them to sit back and pretend that everything is fine. It’s easier to sometimes fall into bed with one another, and to press kisses into each other’s lips when they’re alone and want some company for the night.

It’s easier to let people assume what they will about them, and it’s easier to not have to explain to people what their relationship is or is not.

(Not that they even know what to call their relationship anyway. They call each other best friend, but they’re something more than that. They don’t call each other their boyfriend, but if someone assumes they are, they don’t correct them.)

It was Sam who once said that they’re just them.  
Liam couldn’t help but agree.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates. But sometimes it’s nice for them to pretend.

*

Their relationship is easy. It always has been.

It’s easy for them to fall into each other’s bed when they're bored or just plain in the mood for sex. It’s easy to pretend like they want to stop having sex. It’s easy to not actually to talk about all the feelings that come along with sleeping with your best friend. Regularly.

Especially when both of them know that whatever it is that the two of them have isn’t going to last.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates.  
They don’t get a happily ever after with each other. They know this.

That’s why it’s also easy for them to go to a bar, either alone or together, and look for something else for the night. Someone else for the night. It’s easy to smile when a pretty human being walks up to one of them flirting and with an offer to buy them a drink. Sometimes they’ll take a stranger up on their offer of a one night stand; sometimes they won’t.

There are nights when the two of them go home for the bar together and fall into bed with one another. There are nights when that doesn’t happen. There are nights that they go home together and they’ll fall into their own beds and wake up in the morning alone.

Some nights instead they climb into a cab with a stranger. They’ll fall into a strange bed, and have sex with a stranger for the fun of it.

Some nights, Liam will press himself into the arms of a man with a few inches and fifty pounds of muscle on him who pulled the Jersey native on the dance floor for a dance. Some nights, Sam will pull him away, claiming him back for himself. Some nights Liam will take the muscular man, whose name he barely remembers, up on his offer for a one night stand. He’ll let the man push him down into the sheets and leave him covered in bruises and with hickies on his thighs.

Liam will sometimes find a woman who will pull him into a kiss in the back of the bar and who will drag him into the back of cab, climbing into his lap in the back seat of the moving yellow car, pressing their lips together furiously, before falling into her bed together.

Some nights Sam would find a man just a bit shorter than him with long enough blond locks that he could pull. (There is always a moment in his mind, before the man would talk to him, that he thinks that he looks vaguely like Liam.) Sometimes when Sam found those men, Liam would come and reclaim him, pushing into his arms and pressing a kiss to his mouth to claim Sam back. Others of those nights would end with him getting pulled into a stall of a bathroom, and the shorter man falling to his knees in front of him.

Sam would sometimes find a woman who was pretty enough and had a nice set of tits. Sometimes Liam would come to him and pull Sam back to him, claiming him back from the stranger. Other nights, Sam would go home with her and have fast and hard sex with rough kisses.

They aren’t soulmates. Sam and Liam don’t need to talk about their jealousy of those nights apart. The jealousy they feel as they watch the other get pulled out of the bar by someone who isn't them. They have no right to stop the other from anything; they have no right to stop each other from having sex.

They aren’t actually soulmates.

Maybe if they keep saying it, then they’ll remember that they don’t get a happily ever after with each other.

*

They’ve known each other close to two years when Liam stops going back to his own room after they have sex. Most nights end with one of them peeling away from the other to slink back into their own respective beds.

(It’s easier for Liam to collapse on top of Sam, his face buried in Sam’s neck, and let sleep claim him. It’s easier to not have to pull away from each other to let sleep claim them. It’s easier to fall asleep wrapped in the warmth of each other, rather than go back to their respective beds, and fall asleep cold, both of them wanting post sex cuddles.)

They’ve known each other for close to two years when Sam wraps his arms around Liam’s waist and buries his face in Liam’s hair and hums along to the music that isn’t actually there. Liam, with his face pressed into Sam’s neck, kissing along the skin that his mouth can reach, whispers “Can I stay the night?”

Sam lets out a sigh into the older man’s hair, as if this is something he’s wanted for months. Liam feels Sam press a kiss into his hair and whispers right back, “Always.”

Once the dam breaks, they stop saying that whatever it is that the two of them have is a one time thing, and it’s an easy transition. They still don’t call each other boyfriends or partners. They're just best friends, who sometimes fuck, and spend progressively more and more nights sleeping pressed skin to skin.

They're not soulmates. Whatever it is that the two of them are building isn’t going to last. They both know that one day, they're both going to meet someone who has their words pressed into their skin and this thing that they have will be over.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien pressed together, skin to skin, in a shitty apartment in a terrible part of town that the two of them can barely afford, making promises that they know they can’t keep. They want this. A part of them wants what the two of them are building, but they both know deep down that they can’t have it. That this life that they’re building isn’t meant to be theirs.

For now though, locked away, pressed skin to skin under the sheets of one of their beds, it’s easy to pretend that it’s gonna last.

*

It’s been two and a half years of knowing each other, and by this point they’ve been having casual sex with each other longer than weren’t. That’s a lie, part of it anyway, the sex that they have is far from casual. It’s the two of them pressed skin to skin slowly taking each other apart with soft kisses, and whispered words of sweet nothings. They call it casual sex because it’s easier. It will be easier to stop whatever it is that they have when they meet their soulmate.

It will be easier to pull away from one another and stop being whatever they are to one another when they meet who they’re meant to be with.

That’s a lie too.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates. They're not meant to be. The fact that they’re not soulmates doesn’t stop them from pretending they can be. Pretending, when they're spread out together in one of their beds, casually laying together, pressed skin to skin, is easy. It’s easier to pretend that when they look at each other, that they're going to be able to keep what the two of them are building with one another instead of wishing that the other was their soulmate.

It’s easier to mess around with other people sometimes, and distance themselves when they feel like they're falling in too deep with each other.

They’re not soulmates, so it’s easier to say that it’s just casual sex and with no actual feelings involved. If they lie to themselves that what they have isn’t serious, well then, when it’s over it will hurt just a little bit less. If they're lying, well then all they’ll really be hurting is themselves in the end.

*

It’s sometime around here that they stop going home with other people when they’re at a bar together.

They’d much rather be with one another than with a stranger.  
They don’t talk about that either.

Sometimes they’ll both go out, pressing a kiss as they leave and head to different bars just so they don’t have to know about what the other is doing.

Ignorance is bliss.

(Sometimes they’ll leave with someone else just to make the other person jealous when they’re mad at one another. They don’t talk about that either.)

*

Liam comes home some mornings covered in bruises and hickies. He’s littered with fingerprints, and teeth marks down his chest and across his thighs. Liam was content with all the marks, still blissed out from the night of rough sex the night before.

Without a doubt every time he comes home like this Sam will pull him into a hug. He’ll gently wrap his arms around Liam, pressing a kiss into his hair, and guide him to his bedroom.

Sam will undress him, slowly pulling at the clothes until he can reach bare skin, pressing kisses into each of the marks as he goes. The kisses are soft and tender and so full of care that Liam melts from the attention.

Sam makes sure to press a kiss into every mark, and rub away any of the tension and pain that Liam has underneath his skin. Sam never says anything about the bruises; he never asks where they came from or how he got on to his skin. Frankly, Sam isn’t sure that he wants to know about how the bruises were left on his skin. He never told Liam off for wanting the bruises; he just wrapped Liam up in a warm embrace and soft blankets and held him close, whispering into his skin words of comfort.

Liam never really put much thought into Sam doing this for him. It was never something he thought twice about. He just enjoyed the comfort. He enjoyed that Sam cared enough to do it. He enjoyed that Sam would go through the effort to care for him like that.

Sam, on the other hand -- the first time he saw Liam covered in bruises, he felt like he should be angry. He doesn’t know who he was meant to be angry at. He wants to be mad at Liam for letting it happen to him. He wants to be mad at the man he saw Liam leaving the bar with last night. Instead, he took one look at Liam and just wanted to hug him. So he did. He had pulled Liam into a hug and all Liam did was babble into his chest. Sam doesn’t remember what Liam had said. He just remembers Liam saying that he wanted it and begging Sam not to be mad at him.

Sam doesn’t remember everything that Liam said that first time. He just remembers taking Liam to bed and pressing kissing into the skin and making sure that everything was okay. Sam doesn’t think could ever press a harsh bruise into Liam’s skin. He’s left bruises in the form of fingerprints on his hip before, and too many hickies to count on Liam’s skin. But the idea of hurting Liam in the way that some of his one night stands do is something that he thinks that he can do. It isn’t something that he wants.

(He tells the older man as much one night when they’re pressed into bed together, Liam covered in fading bruises from a night or so prior. Liam smiles at him, soft and warm, and says that it doesn’t matter; what he gives to him now is more than enough.)

*

The first time they share a bed is way before they start having sex. It’s back in New York, before things were complicated, and it was easy for them to share a bed. Back then it was easy to fall into bed with one another when they were too drunk to make their way home and not really in the mood to spend money on a cab. Back then it was just two friends cuddling mostly drunk and happy for someone warm to cuddle.

Close to three years later, they didn’t share a bed without some kind of sex first. It was almost an unwritten rule between them. Like if they had sex first it somehow made it okay to sleep cuddled together in the same bed.

Like it somehow changes the way that their feelings work.

Some nights it would be all out. It would be Sam slowly fingering Liam before pressing into him, the two of them finding a soft rhythm between them. Some nights it would be Liam pounding into Sam hard and fast until they were both spent. Some nights it would be quick hand jobs, the two of them just wanting to press together and spend the night in each other arms, but stubbornly refusing to share a bed without sex first.

For them, the sex was just a bonus. The real reward was getting to spend time together wrapped up together, Liam on top of Sam, his face pressed into his neck and the younger man’s arms wrapped tightly around Liam’s waist, his face buried in the blond locks.

It takes them longer than either of them are willing to admit to get to the point where they realized that they didn’t need sex to share a bed. The two of them are both stubborn, and assholes, and almost 30 by the time they own up to wanting to skip the sex some nights.

It’s Liam who drops into Sam’s bed one night, and when Sam asks about sex in the usual way that they do, the older man is silent for a moment. Instead of moving in their usual pattern, Liam huffs, turning to bury his face into Sam’s chest, mouthing into the soft fabric that he just wants to sleep.

Sam wraps his arms around Liam and drops a kiss into his hair, whispering that it was okay.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates. They aren’t meant to be, but it’s easy for nights to end wrapped in each other, even on nights when they don’t have sex first.

*

It’s a Wednesday, when Liam realizes that he loves Sam. That’s not exactly true. He and Sam have loved each other for most of their friendship, but it’s a Wednesday nearly four years to the day that they met that he realizes he is _in love _with Sam. There weren’t fireworks or explosions. All of Sam and Liam’s doubts about their relationship weren’t magically fixed.

It was just a normal Wednesday, with Sam and Liam moving around each other in their apartment cleaning the place and doing laundry.

It wasn’t a big romantic gesture that made him realize it or even anything really memorable. It was just Sam, standing in their kitchen dressed in a worn thin t-shirt that the color and design on the front was almost completely faded. It was Sam in a purple pair of boxers that had been a gift from him right after Sam had gotten cast as Donatello, doing dishes.

That’s all. It was just a moment in their lives, a second where Liam looked at Sam who was humming along to the song playing in the background and thought he wishes more than anything that he could have this forever. It’s a strange thought, especially knowing that this isn’t meant to be. Liam looked at Sam, soap covering his arms, backgrounded by the sound of clanging dishes, soft pop music and running water and not for the first time, wished that this could be it for him.

It wasn’t something new. He’s looked at Sam a hundred times and had that same thought. The realization though, that he wanted this life that he and Sam have already built more than he wanted his soulmate and whatever life that would give him was a new feeling.

Logically he knows that him and Sam wouldn’t work in the long run. He knows from experience that nonsoulmated couples don’t work in the long run. He knows that one day this is going to end. But whether this relationship ends from them meeting their pair or ends nastily with anger and bitter words thrown at each other is still to be seen.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates. The two of them aren’t meant to fall in love with each other. But Liam looks at the man who every night he falls into bed with. The man who holds him at his worst, and tell him that he loves him regularly. Looks at him washing dishes, humming along to the radio and realizes he’s  
.

It’s a hard thought to realize he’s in love with a man who the world says he can’t love.

Liam walked over to Sam, wrapping his arms around his waist and pressing his face into Sam’s back. Sam huffed out a laugh and asks Liam what’s up. He’ll smile into the younger man’s back and whisper into a mouth full of fabric, “I love you.”

Sam will laugh and turn out just enough to pull Liam into a kiss.  
He’ll whisper it right back.

It’s not a world ending realization. It’s not life changing or dramatic. Their relationship doesn’t up and change. Liam doesn’t even tell Sam about this realization. It’s just like any other Wednesday really.

*

There’s only one time that Liam comes home covered in bruises on the night that it happened. Sam knows Liam well enough to know that he likes cuddling after sex. They both do, but that’s beside the point, because after a night like this, Liam thrives on contact and comfort, and spending that time being cared for by the man who he had spent the night with. So Liam coming home, covered in bruises, glassy eyed and with a thousand yard stare, Sam thinks he might actually commit murder.

Sam doesn’t know much about this side of Liam. He knows that it’s been happening less and less the older they’ve gotten. He knows that Liam craves comfort afterward, and from what little research he’s done into the subject, he knows that doms shouldn’t let their subs walk out the door after a scene.

The Liam that walks into the door isn’t in any way okay.  
This Liam takes one look at Sam and bursts into tears, collapsing into his arms. Sam wraps his arms around the blonde, pulling him close, his face dropping into Liam’s hair.

Liam’s face is wet against his shirt, and he’s not saying anything. Just shaking in his arms, and crying fat, wet tears down his cheeks. Sam pressing a kiss into his hair before guiding him in the direction towards their small kitchen. When he pulls away to grab a glass from the shelf, Liam stumbles a step forward towards him with a whine, practically collapsing back into his arms. Sam stood there in the middle of their kitchen with Liam crying in his arms, whispering “Okay, okay, it’s okay Liam,” into his hair.

Sam moves again carefully, this time keeping Liam in contact with him, moving just enough to fill a glass of water. He gently moves the glass towards Liam’s lips and tips it back just enough so the blonde could slowly drink the water.

Liam drank what was put in front of him, his hands moved and grasped at the front of Sam’s shirt. It was enough tension that the fabric was tight against his shoulders. He was still shaking in Sam’s grip. Silently crying, and holding onto Sam like his life depended on it.

Sam had a lot racing through his mind, but at the forefront of all of his thoughts is to make sure Liam was okay. He’s never seen Liam like this before, silent and falling apart in his arms and shaking like a scared dog on the Fourth of July.

When the glass was empty, he whispered, breaking the silence, “Do you want more, sweetheart?”

Liam debated for a silent moment, and shook his head no after a second. Sam nodded in response, and began guiding Liam towards his own room. He nudged the door open, and moved Liam towards the bed, laying him down with his knees bend against the end, and feet planted on the floor. Liam’s hands scramble to push himself up, and find contact with Sam again, frantically reaching out for him.

Sam moved between his legs, whispering softly words of reassurance that he wasn’t going anywhere. That he wasn’t going to leave him. The shaking didn’t stop, but the frantic motion to grab on to Sam again lessened. It was enough that Sam could work on opening the buttons of the shirt.

Sam expected bruises under the longsleeve shirt he was wearing. That’s how nights like this one go for Liam. He comes home the next morning content and covered in marks. What he wasn’t expecting was the amount of marks lining his chest. There were solid bands of purple and blue skin around his wrists, and harsh red lines mixed in with fingerprint shaped marks along his chest and hips.

“Oh Liam,” it was barely over a whisper as his fingers ghosted over the skin, lightly rubbing over the marks. Sam didn’t judge. He didn’t yell, or get angry at Liam wanting the marks. He didn’t care that Liam enjoyed doing things like this. But looking down at Liam marked up more than he’s ever seen him, and falling hard into a post play drop, he was angry. Not at Liam, but whoever it was that left him like this.

Whoever left Liam shaking and in tears, and kicked him out of their apartment without a second thought. He wasn’t angry at Liam, he wasn’t his soulmate. Sam had no right to criticize what Liam gets up to, it wasn’t like Sam didn’t also sleep with other people too.

Sam let his fingers run along Liam’s chest for a moment before pulling the button of Liam’s pants. He dragged the stiff jeans down, until Liam was laying on his bed in only his boxers. His thighs had the same red marks, and bruises that littered his arm, and chest. Sam pulled Liam to his feet, and pressed a kiss to the corner of his mouth. Before guiding him again in the direction of the bathroom. It was easy for Sam to pull away just long enough to turn the knob of the bathtub to run a hot bath. It was easy for Sam to guide Liam into the warm water and let the pains and lingering soreness fade.

If Sam climbed into the bathtub behind Liam, wrapping his arms around the smaller man’s waist, pressing kisses into Liam’s hair, and letting Liam melt into him as the warm water helped washed the lingering soreness away, that was no ones business but their own.  
  
(Liam never told Sam what happened that night. Why he didn’t spend the night at the Doms house. Why the dom kicked him to the street shaking and in tears. Sam never asked. But Liam, even years later, remembers moaning out Sam’s name out instead of the name of the Dom and the reaction of hasty and painful motions that followed.)

*

It’s around this time the first time Sam takes a sharpie to Liam’s skin and writes “Having a good weekend so far?”

Liam blinks down at the words written across his forearm and pulls Sam down into a kiss. Before pulling the pen from Sam’s hand and writing “Busy. But yeah, it’s been fun so far.” across Sam’s collar bone.

Sam whispers “I love you,” when Liam pulls the pen away, and they fall into bed with one another, trying to forget about the words that won’t wash off with soap and water.

They were both drunk enough that in the morning they don’t talk about it, letting the ink wash down the drain and out of sight.

(It’s not the last time one of them would take a sharpie to their skin, wishing for something that they don’t have.)

*

It’s early into 2007 when they're in a bar pressed into a booth, just the two of them. Liam is practically in Sam’s lap, and the last of their friends that they were here with had left close to an hour ago. They're both buzzed enough that when a pretty blonde haired girl, dressed in such a way that her breasts were pretty much in full display dropped down into the booth across from them they let her stay. They let the conversation flow into something more.

They don’t know how the conversation started to steer towards talks of sex. Casual flirting that leading into the girl asking if they’ve ever had a three way.

The girl assumes they're soulmates. They don’t correct her. They don’t tell her that they aren’t.

The two of them were just drunk enough that when the girl asked to come home with them, they shared a look and told her yes.

It wasn’t an idea that either of them had thought about before. It wasn’t something that they talked about. It was just something that happened in the heat of the moment.

The girl was pretty, with soft curls and nice eyes, and kissed both of them like this was more than a one night stand. They took her back to their apartment. It's probably the first time they’ve ever brought anyone back to their own place, breaking their own unwritten rule that they’ve had in place for years.

She was a beautiful woman, and her fingers nimble and talented. She was good in bed.

And in all honesty, it was a nice night.

What neither of them expected to come out of the night was for the two of them to hate it. It wasn’t that it was a bad experience, or the girl wasn’t a pleasure to sleep with. It was the experience of watching the other with her that was the problem.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates. They have no right to be jealous of what or who the other person is doing. They have no reason to be jealous when they're also pressed together sharing the bed with the same woman.

It was an experience for both of them. It was a good night, and the next morning the woman pressed kisses to both of their mouths and declined their offer of breakfast.

They didn’t talk about it. There is no conversation about how neither of them liked it. There is no conversation about the jealousy that they both felt. They didn’t talk about everything that happened. But there was a silent agreement that they weren’t gonna do that again.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates. They don’t get to decide what the other person does and doesn’t do with their lives.

They aren’t soulmates, but it’s easy to identify the feeling that washed over them that night as jealousy.

*

Like many things for them, there wasn’t a conversation when their lease ran out. Well, there was a conversation, but it wasn’t a matter of them talking about whether they should get their own places. It was a conversation about whether they should get a new apartment or stay here. For them, even if they did not talk about, living without each other wasn’t an option for either of them.

They aren’t soulmates. They don’t get to live together forever and a day. But they can hold on to each other for as long as they do have.

There was a conversation about how they wanted to live somewhere nicer than their current shitty apartment that was small and cramped and run down. They had a conversation about how they wanted to live in an apartment that allowed pets. (“I would like a cat,” is what Liam had said to Sam in the darkness of their room during this conversation when the topic of living somewhere pet friendly was brought up. Sam had huffed a laugh in the fabric of his pillow, turning over to let his hand rest on the small of Liam’s back, “I think we should get a dog; dogs are better than cats anyway,”)

They look at apartments together. They agree on the apartment they choose together. A two bedroom apartment with white walls that the landlord says that’s it okay for them to paint. It’s in a nicer part of town and larger than their last. It’s pet friendly, and according to the person who showed them the apartment, there is a dog friendly park not that far away. The building is newer, and it’s closer to the part of the city that they work in.

There’s a moment when the apartment is full of boxes and half assembled Ikea furniture spread across the wooden floors, that they look at each other. Both of them standing half way between the two bedroom doors boxes in hand, looking at each other for answers. There were two bedrooms in the apartment, and neither of them were sure if the other wanted to share one of the rooms. Sure in their other apartment, they spent nights together pressed skin to skin, and the bed in whatever one of their rooms they ended up in for the night. But they still had their own rooms.

It was Liam, who looked at Sam, and asked “Are we gonna, or should I?”

It was enough for Sam to nod his head kicking open the door to the larger of the two rooms, leading Liam inside.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien weren’t soulmates. But still they shared a room together, their clothes mixing in the closet and in the drawers. They set the second bedroom up as a guest room with a cheap bed and a painting that also came from Ikea. They still call their apartment their apartment. There are fewer and fewer people in their lives that know that they aren’t actually soulmates, and more and more people who assume that they are.

They stop correcting people and yet they still don’t refer to each other as boyfriends. There are people who call them that. There are people who call them partners, and people who call them husbands. They have friends that at this point have known them for years who refer to them as husbands. They don’t correct them. They go on living together in this bubble, both of them knowing that one day it’s going to pop.

For now they live in their bubble of a made up perfect life that they know that they're never going to be able to keep.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates. But they're going to keep faking it until the day comes that their life comes to an end. Or they meet their soulmates.  
But those just might be one and the same.

*

The first time they have sex in their new place is fifteen minutes after they are handed the keys to the apartment. It’s them slamming closed the door to an empty apartment with nothing more than a refrigerator humming a soft background noise. It’s Liam crashing his lips into Sam’s, pushing the young man backwards into the nearest blank white wall.

Sam’s back hits the wall and Liam’s hand tangles into his hair, both of them groaning as their tongues intertwined and Sam’s thigh presses between his legs.

Liam moves the hand not currently holding on to Sam’s hair toward Sam’s belt, while both of the younger man’s hands move toward Liam. His right hand pulling at his shirt trying to get his fingers onto skin, and the left hand wrapping around the back of Liam’s neck. It takes some maneuvering, but Sam’s pants fall to his knees and so does Liam.

Sam pulls his hand up into Liam’s hair, tugging him closer as his breath ghosted over his boxers. Liam’s fingers tugged at the colorful boxers, introducing his mouth almost as soon as he could to Sam’s dick. Liam is well practiced in taking Sam’s cock, whether like this or in other ways. So it’s easy for him to swallow the long member to the base in one motion.

It’s easy for them to quickly work getting each other off against the wall of their new and empty apartment. First Sam coming down Liam’s throat, then Liam’s own cum spreading between their stomachs.

They fall to the ground, naked and piled on top of each other, laughing at how ridiculous they are. The floors are hard against their backs and cold against their bare skin. But for the moment, the two of them are content to lay there on the floor pressed together, covered in cum, and laughing at how dumb they are.

*  
They get older, and nights out become more rare. They're busier and more booked with jobs. They get older and the appeal of blow jobs in the back restrooms of seedy dives become more and more unappealing.

They’d rather spend their limited free time with a bottle of wine and each other. Wearing just boxers and watching shitty movies.  
They’d rather spend their limited free time in the back of an expensive restaurant talking about their busy days, vaguely mentioning what they can about things that they're not under gag orders about.

They aren’t soulmates. According to the two of them, they're not even dating, but it’s easy for the two of them to fall into something that resembles a relationship.

It’s also easy for them not to realize that they’ve stopped spending nights in other people’s beds.  
It’s easy to continue the jokes about the different people that they're sleeping with.

*  
Sam makes off handed comments about the girls he’s sleeping with when Liam isn’t around. About hasty blow jobs in the back of bars, and hand jobs in taxi’s.

Liam makes off handed comments about the guys who he goes home with. How they're strong and know how to make his night. About the girls who he presses down into the sheets of a mattress.

Neither of them know if the other is joking.  
Both of them hope the other one knows that it’s slowly just become the two of them.

*

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates. They aren’t people who get to spend the rest of their lives together. They don’t get to get to plan for their future. They don’t get to talk about spending the rest of their lives together without remembering that one day this is going to end. That this isn’t real.

They're constantly reminded that one day this is going to end. That this will be taken away from them no matter how much they both want it to be their future. There isn’t going to be a happy ending for them.

Instead they're stuck being pressed together in their shared apartment drinking expensive wine, and taking a permanent marker to their skin so they can pretend for just a bit longer.

*

They’ve been living in their new apartment for well over a year, when they have a moment of realization that it’s just them. That this thing that they have is a relationship. It’s Sam waking up with red bumps up his thighs. It’s a moment of panic, because it’s not nail marks that sometimes get left on his skin by Liam, it’s not bite marks or scratch marks. It’s something else.

They don’t talk about what they think it is. They both know exactly what the other is thinking. That’s why they spend that afternoon in a doctor’s office.  
Sam sitting alone on the table, the sound of paper crinkling as he moved even the slightest bit. He’s sitting alone in a doctor's office with Liam in the next room over seeing a different doctor not wanting to think about what’s happening. He’s watching the doctor flip through his medical chart asking him personal questions.

It’s a flurry of questions that leave both Sam and Liam flushed red.

“How many sexual partners have you had in the last year?”

The question isn’t surprising given why the two of them were here. It the fact that it takes a minute for them to answer. The two of them in separate rooms, looking at the floor, the room cold and the sound of paper crinkling every time they move.

It’s the moment where both of realizes that they’ve somehow become exclusive.

It’s a moment where the two different doctors ask the same question at two separate moments, being asked about how many partners they’ve had, and both of them answer one.

It’s a moment for them where they realize that they can’t remember the last person that they even slept with that wasn’t the other.

It’s stripping away all the jokes and gags and lies and leaving just them behind.

Sam Riegel doesn’t have what he woke up thinking about. He doesn’t have what Liam woke and thought he had. He just has a bad heat rash lining his upper thighs.

But as he and Liam sit eating pizza after the doctor, Sam blurts out, “I haven't slept with anyone else in well over a year,”

Liam is quiet for a moment, the sound of the hustling pizza parlor around them.

“I haven’t either,”

The topic drops, and they conversation flows back to different things they’ve been working on that doesn’t fall under a NDA.

*

They still don’t say that they're dating. They're just them.

In the morning, Liam leaves for a run while Sam gets ready to leave for his day. The blonde will press a kiss to Sam’s lips before heading out the door. Sam will be gone by the time he gets back, and they’ll spend the day sending text messages back and forth. Different messages of nonsense and questions about dinner, and about stopping to pick something on their way home.

They spend their lives together, clothes mixed in drawers and closets. Pressed skin to skin under the covers; kisses shared with smiles on their faces.

They aren’t soulmates. The two of them are setting themselves up for a disaster. They’re together, but not. In Love, but pushing it away. They spend their time thinking about their future, but it's only doomed to crash and burn.

*  
Sam presses a soft kiss to Liam’s mouth. The two of them are pressed skin to skin, wrapped in each other, and letting the outside world fade away.

“I love you,” Sam said into Liam’s mouth, a secret for just the two of them. It’s not the first kiss, not by a long shot. It’s not the first time that they’ve professed their love for one another. But this time, in the dimly lit bedroom, pressed together, and whispering secrets to one other feels different.

It’s not much different than any other time. Liam still smiles back into Sam’s mouth, and whispers it back without any hesitation.

It’s soft and just for the two of them.

“I love you, Sammy,” Liam whispers again, a prayer as Sam takes him apart with fingers and teeth.

*  
It takes them longer than expected to the point where they have time to commit themselves to getting a pet. There is, to be fair, a lot of back and forth between getting a kitten or a puppy. When they do finally set off in hopes of finding an animal to adopt, it’s agreed upon that it should be a puppy, and close to two years after they moved into their second shared apartment.

The shelter that they find time in their busy lives to go to is just outside of Los Angeles. It’s busier than they expected the movement of people around them as they’re led down a maze of hallways to the room that houses the puppies. There are a handful, a couple that are sleek black, and more than a few that are white with brown spots littering their fur. Sam and Liam stand there listening as the woman stands there talking about the puppies, the small things nipping at their heels.

Eventually they sit down with the young dogs, and Sam must of have turned his back at some point his attention fully draw upon the puppies, because after a few minutes of petting the dogs He looks up and Liam is gone.

Sam blinks a few times, looking at where Liam was just a few moments before and the woman who was helping them, laughed and said, “your partner asked to go see the kittens,”

Sam huffs out a laugh in response, because of course Liam left him in a pile of puppies to find cats. The dogs nip at his heels, and continue to try and jump on him as he stands, asking the woman to help him find Liam.  
Later on, years down the line, Sam will point to this moment and realize that Liam is it for him. It’s moment of walking into a room full of tiny kittens of various colors and sizes, and looking at Liam sitting crossed legged on the floor, a soft smile on his face whispering to the fluffy white cat in his hands.

It’s not anyone feeling that washes over him. It’s a sudden rush of love, and affection, and warmth, and just happiness.

Even years and years later it’s hard for Sam to explain. Why everything clicked for him in that moment. Why looking up at him with a big smile on his face holding the tiny white kitten up in his direction was so life changing. Sam takes a step forward and then another and then he’s kneeling in front of Liam. Liam looks down at the kitten, and Sam leans forward pressing a kiss to his forehead. There aren't any fireworks or explosions or the slowing of time. It’s just Liam talking about this little white kitten to his partner, and Sam softly smiling at him.

For Sam, watching Liam make his case for why they should adopt this little white kitten, and giving Sam his best puppy dog eyes, it’s just this feeling.

Warmth and Love and Happiness and Want and Affection.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates. By just the nature of that, they shouldn’t get to spend forever together. By the rules of the universe they don’t get to spend forever together. There is someone out there who is their other half, destined by fate herself, to be perfect.

Sam and Liam don’t get that. They don’t get perfectness and the assurance that this is forever.

But looking at Liam, the man he’s loved for almost eight years, holding up a tiny white kitten that’s more fur than cat, and explaining why they should adopt her, he suddenly realizes that none of that matters.

He wants to love Liam. He wants to spend forever with the man. He wants to start a family with him. He wants everything that comes with soulmates. He was the future that the two of them whisper about knowing that they can never have it.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates. But after close to eight years of knowing each other and whispering promises and saying that they are, Sam Riegel doesn’t give a fuck that Liam O’Brien isn’t his soulmate.

They’re doing just fine as just them. They don’t need the universe to tell them that they're meant to be. They already know that they're meant to be.

*  
The little white kitten gets named Legolas. She is tiny and the woman at the shelter says she’s probably going to triple in size by the time she’s fully grown. The little cat right now is more fur than cat, and adores the two of them from the first moment of knowing them.

She comes home with them with a basket full of toys from PetsSmart, a pink water and food dish with little fish lining the ceramic, and a tiny pink collar with a tiny bell hanging from a ring.

(Sam Riegel maintains that he doesn’t like cats. Even as he holds her as they walk through the aisles of the pet store that first day with her, filling their cart with various toys and treats for their new little cat daughter. All the while, the small little thing purring in his hands, as Sam pretends that she isn’t the most adorable thing he’s ever seen.)

(He calls her Lego.)

*

Nothing really changes after they adopt Legolas. Not in the long run of things. The two of them are still playing their game of saying their not dating, but doing all the things that revolve around being a couple. They’re each others plus one to events. They spend nights sitting across from one another in an expensive restaurant, with a candle light between them and sharing an overpriced bottle of wine.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates. This is, by how nature dictates, going to end one day. Liam mourns for the future that he is destined to have, as Sam plans for his future with Liam that he wants, and knows Liam wants as wells.

*

There is a ring shop on the way to one of the studios that Sam works at fairly often. He goes in there on a Thursday afternoon and buys a ring.

He doesn’t plan on buying a ring when he walks into the shop. But still he stops in front of the display of rings and looks. He looks and he keeps thinking about it.

Engagement rings really aren’t a thing anymore. Even those whose soulmarks are hidden away under clothes tend to nowadays get their marks pressed into metal. They’re only really still a thing for people who don’t have words on their skin, for soulmates who have been together for a long period of time and want to renew their love, or who have lost their soulmate and found love again.

They aren’t for people like him and Liam, who are both still young enough to be hopeful in finding their other half.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates. They don’t get this.  
They can have this if they want. It’s a choice. And it’s one that Sam Riegel wants to make.

There is a ring. It’s platinum, a solid weight in his palm and simple. It’s beautiful, and intricately engraved with a ring of complex designs around the center. It’s a ring that won’t catch when they’re doing things. That won’t get caught in things, and won’t hinder Liam in everyday life.

It’s beautiful, and something that he can very easily imagine seeing on Liam’s finger every day for the rest of their lives.

Sam wants the happily ever after they planned together in a whisper, a secret for just the two of them. A future of the two of them with Lego, and maybe a puppy at some point. A future where they grow old together and get to move back to New York, or New Jersey, and forget about Hollywood for a little while. A future with a house with a big backyard, and a swing set for tiny humans to be pushed on.

Sam wants that future more than anything else.

(He has a ring in a little black box to prove it.)  
(He also buys a bright blue ring pop, because Sam Riegel can’t be expected to be serious 100 percent of the time.)

*

It takes Sam two weeks to find a night that he can steal Liam away for the night and take him out to a proper dinner. He gets at reservations at their favorite restaurant, where the food is average at best, but the wine is fancy, and the atmosphere reminds them of Manhattan.

They spend their dinner together catching up with one another. They live together, share a bed, and still at times if feels like they don’t have time for things like this. They don’t have the time to spend a night, smiles painted on their faces, buzzed on overpriced wine and genuinely happy to be with each other.

And even just a night where they can eat okay pizza and drink expensive wine talking about everything they wanted to talk about since their last time they had more time together than just enough to press a kiss to the other’s lips and go.

Even tonight, with Sam sitting across from Liam, his palm sweating with the nerves of what he’s going to ask Liam tonight, and a small black box in his pocket, this time together is still easy.

He’s nervous and excited and more than anything Sam Riegel wants this.

He wants to love Liam openly. He wants to show the world that Liam in his in more ways than just sharpie written across their skin when they’re drunk. More ways than just mostly hidden hickies and cloth covered fingerprints left on their hips after sex.

More ways than words written across Liam’s collarbone that aren’t his.

It’s easy for them to make it through dinner because small talk is easy. It’s comfortable and relaxing. It’s both of them eating borderline terrible food and not caring because it’s the company that matters. The small black box is a heavy weight in Sam’s pocket, but that doesn’t matter. He’s in love, and that’s what really matters. They're more tipsy than he planned, but it's fine. He just loves Liam so much.

They take a taxi home, and Liam spends most of the ride completely in Sam’s lap. It’s not different from any other time that they’ve road in a taxi together, half drunk and high on their time together. Sam’s arms rest around his waist holding Liam in place, and his face pressed into the back of his neck, a smile against the sweaty skin there.

They stumble out of the taxi, and still mostly press together as they stumble up the stairs in the direction of their apartment. Sam’s hand is on Liam’s back, and the older man’s arm is looped around Sam’s neck. They're mostly drunk, and giggling about nothing and everything when they find their door. Liam presses against Sam’s back as he fumbles with his keys.

Liam’s beard is rough against the nape of his neck, and his mouth is trying his hardest to get Sam to drop his keys. He fumbles for a second more, before the two of them finally push into their apartment. The door slams shut behind them, and the two of them crash into each other, both of them pulling at clothes as their teeth clash in a deep kiss.

The two of them are drunk, in love, and Sam mumbled his question into Liam’s mouth.  
“Marry me,” a whispered secret that catches both of the by surprise. This isn’t how Sam was planning on saying it. It isn’t what Liam thought Sam was going to say to him.

Liam pulls back from Sam, and he can already feel the tears building in his eyes, and the panic building in his chest. He wants to say yes. Every part of Liam O’Brien wants to say yes. Sam fumbles in his clothes for a second and with the crinkling of yellow wrapping as he presents Liam with a ring pop. A small smile on his face as he falls to one knee.

Liam feels the panic in his chest build more and more. He wants this. He wants it so bad that it hurts. It would be simple, it would be easy for Liam to say yes, but deep down he knows that he can’t.

It wouldn’t work. It couldn’t work. No matter how much he wants this, and this life that they have together, they don’t get to have it. Everything that their building together is eventually going to crash and burn. Liam O’Brien loves Sam Riegel freely and fiercely and with all his heart. He wants to spend forever and then some with him.

But in the end, Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates. No matter how many times the two of them take a sharpie to their skin, their words don’t match. Even the permanence of a permanent marker fades away with a little time, soap and water. According to the world, they don’t get to have this relationship. This happily ever after the two of them want and that the two of them are building isn’t how their story ends. Liam doesn’t get to have the storybook ending he wants so bad. He knows this.  
No matter how many tears that he’s sheds over it, no matter how badly he wants to pull Sam up off the ground and into a kiss and whisper yes as many times as it takes for Sam to pull at the wrapping of the candy ring and for him to slip it on to his finger. No matter how badly he wants to see Sam dressed to the nines, both of them in crisp white suits and exchanging vows for the world to hear. They don’t get to have it.

They could marry each other, and live together in a glass house. A relationship bound to break, and in a marriage always one conversation away from shattering into a million pieces. He loves Sam Riegel more than anything. He wants more than anything to spend the rest of his life with his partner, with his husband in every sense of the word, but the legal one. But he knows that someday he’ll meet the someone out there who has his words. And in the end, more than anything he doesn’t want what the two of them have with each other to fall apart even after they lose this. Despite everything that the two of them have, their love, their relationship that they avoid calling one, Sam is still his best friend.  
He doesn’t want to lose that friendship, and Sam as a whole when everything does finally come crashing down on them.

He looks down at Sam, shaking his head, tears forming in his eyes.  
He wants to say yes so bad. He can’t.  
Sam Riegel asks Liam O’Brien a question, one that he asks while on one knee while drunk and with a small smile on his face.  
Liam O’Brien tells Sam Riegel no, falling to his knees in front of Sam, crashing into him and sobbing.

“I want to, I want to so bad, but Sammy we can’t, I don't want to lose you and I don’t,” Liam is babbling all the reasons why they can’t into Sam’s chest, the fabric wetting and Liam’s hand grasping onto Sam as if he’s the only thing that matters.

Sam doesn’t cry. His heart is in two pieces, but he doesn’t cry. He pulls Liam closer against his chest, his arms settling around Liam’s waist and whispers it’s okay to the older man, a repeated mantra as he sobs.

“We can if you want,” Sam whispers into the top of his head, “we don’t have to follow what the world says we have to do.”

Liam turns his face and the wetness of his cheeks are pressed into Sam’s neck, “I don’t want to lose you; I don’t want you to leave when everything burns for us.”

There are tears forming in Sam’s eyes now, he closes them as he pressed a kiss to Liam’s forehead, “Never,” he said holding Liam tighter and letting the darkness and the relative silence of their apartment wash over him. “I will stay with you as long as you’ll have me sweetheart.”

“You promise, Sammy?”

“Forever. Liam, it doesn’t matter if we meet our Soulmates, I’ll still be with you, if you’ll have me.”

“You’ll still love me? Even then?”

“I promise.”

As they whisper vows and promises in the darkness of the hallway of their apartment to with the vague sound of clacking claws against hardwood, and Liam’s muffled sobs into Sam’s chest, Liam whispers into Sam’s chest, “I want to marry you, Sam.”

Liam can feel the tears falling from Sam now, a soft wetness dropping on to his head. “I know honey, I know.”

“We… Sam, Sammy, We can’t.”

Sam lets out a broken sob, now too openly crying into his partner and said “I know.”

“Promise me this won’t change anything,” Liam says barely loud enough for Sam to hear. A broken plea into his skin through tears.

“I promise.”

*  
Eventually they pull themselves off of the floor and head off to bed, shedding their clothes as they do. Liam falls into Sam’s chest, still mostly crying. They can hear Legolas moving around in the darkness of their room, the pitter-patter of her claws soft against whatever she’s walking on.

They do settle eventually. Their tears run dry and neither of them quite know what to say to the other to break the silence. Eventually, Sam does pull Liam up into a soft kiss. A quick peck on the lips, and a solid reminder that he’s still there. That nothing has changed between the two of them. Liam smiles into the soft kiss, one hand resting against the younger man’s cheek before Liam settles back down against him, and pressing a kiss into Sam’s neck. It’s silent for another moment, both of them wanting to fill the silence and neither of them knowing what to say to the other.  
It takes a moment, but Sam starts to sing. A soft melody filling the quiet of the room, and Liam smiles. It’s a song that Sam has sang to him a thousand times before.

Liam settles and is just about asleep when Sam’s singing fades away, his hand still rubbing circles against his back.

“Sammy?” It’s a whisper against his neck, quiet and mumbled. He feels Sam press another kiss against the top of his head. “I love you, Sammy.”

Sam smiles into the top of his head and returns the sentiment.

*

The two of them pick up themselves, and life goes on. The Ring Pop stays wrapped and firmly planted on a shelf in their kitchen. A reminder of something that neither of them want to think about.

A reminder of something they both want, but can’t have.

Sam buys a chain for the ring. He doesn’t tell Liam about what the ring was for. He tells an easy lie of it being from his mom and some kind of family heirloom. Liam doesn’t question it, and the ring gets worn around the younger man’s neck every day. His own way of showing the world that he’s a taken man. That he has someone that he calls his, and someone who calls him theirs.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien might not be soulmates, but Sam Riegel doesn’t give a fuck about that anymore.

*

They’ve known each other for ten years. They’ve spent ten years together, and almost as long as something akin to a couple. The two of them aren’t soulmates. They aren’t destined to spend their life together, but on days like today that’s very easy to forget about that.

Liam woke Sam up on a date that the two of them will never forget but have stubbornly refused to call their anniversary with a mouth wrapped solidly around his dick. Sam’s boxers have been pushed down just enough to give the blond clearance to work. Sam’s hand wraps around the back of Liam’s head (he definitely doesn’t miss the hair, nope not at all) and holds him there for a second, before pulling him up off his dick and into a kiss.

Sam can taste himself on Liam’s tongue as the older man laughs into the kiss, and a hand wraps around his dick again. Sam smiles as he pulls away from the kiss, and whispers, “You're in a mood this morning sweetheart,”

Liam smiles dropping down into another quick kiss to his lips and said “Today’s our anniversary, Sammy,” with a laugh.

Sam laughs at him -- the older man’s laughter has always been contagious -- as his own hands are finding Liam’s hips and pushing under the fabric of his pants. They’ve never called it an anniversary before. But Sam still has a present tucked away for Liam, and Liam has one tucked away for Sam. They’ve never called it an anniversary before, but they have dinner reservations tonight at the fancy restaurant that they frequent when they have the time to spare.

Liam still lets Sam pull him down into a kiss, and whisper back “Happy Anniversary, Liam,”. Apart of Sam wonders why this is the anniversary that Liam decides to call it such. The other part of Sam is just happy to have his best friend pressed close, and happy. The two of them laughing at nothing and slowly working each other towards a climax.

It’s a good Anniversary.

*

The whole idea of the two of starting a podcast together comes on a Thursday night in early 2012, or more accurately it comes on a Thursday night where Sam looks at Liam as they're moving around each other in their kitchen preparing dinner and realizes that he hasn’t seen the other man for more than a few minutes in almost a month. He fiddles with the ring still firmly planted around his neck, and catches Liam with a hand wrapping around his waist and pulling him up into a kiss. The kiss is slow and tender, and Liam smiles into it. Every kiss between the two of them is like this, filled with love, and like coming home.

Sam smiles when Liam pulls away and whispers, “I miss you,”

Liam laughs, and whispers back “I’m right here, Sammy,” as he presses another kiss to the corner of Sam’s mouth, and he laughs at pulls away turning back to the food on the stove.

“I mean that we haven’t spent any time together recently,” Sam says as he wraps his arms around Liam’s waist, and rests his chin on his shoulder. Liam hums, and lets Sam continue to let the younger man hold him as he stirs the food. “We should do something, just the two of us,”

Liam hums and they let the silence wash over them again. Liam standing at the stove stirring their dinner, and Sam behind him holding the older man against his chest. After a moment, Liam asks “What should we do then?”

Sam thinks about it for a minute, pressing a kiss into Liam’s neck before pulling away and leaning against the counter. “I just feel like I haven’t gotten to spend a date night with you in forever,”

And they haven’t. Even tonight, the bliss of them living the domestic bliss of moving around each other and cooking dinner is the first time they’ve gotten to do this in months. They’re both terribly busy with work that they can’t talk about, piling on top of voice acting gigs, writing and directing work. It’s been a struggle to see each other with more than a few minutes with the limited free time that they do have.

What they do have is a quick kiss the morning as Liam’s tying his shoes heading out for a run before he has to actually be productive, and Sam headed out the door to the other side of town for an interview. What they do have is collapsing into bed both run ragged after a long day of running around Los Angeles for three separate jobs. What they do have is barely having time to have dinner together like this more than once every couple of weeks.

Sometimes it feels like that they don’t live together anymore, even though they spend every night in the same bed with their steadily growing kitten asleep at their feet.

“We don’t even really get the pleasure of working together anymore either,” Sam said moving around Liam to pull plates out of the cabinet. The older man hums in agreeance, as Sam hands over the plates. They go on cooking dinner in silence, moving around each other, setting the table.

A few minutes later and the two of them are eating in silence, Legolas circling their legs and looking for their attention or food. The silence lasts for a moment before Liam says “What if we started a podcast?”

Sam hums around his food. It’s good, just like everything Liam cooks. “What would a podcast starring the two of us even be about?” Liam takes a bite of food, hums thinking about it how to answer the question. The silence washes over them again, broken only by Legolas finally getting bored of circling their feet and jumping on the table to see what is going on with her humans. Sam is quick to grab her, dropping her on his lap, and letting the fur ball sprawl on his lap.

Liam takes a sip of his drink before saying “We can just use it as an excuse to go on dates.”

Sam laughs around his mouth full of pasta, and Liam smiles back at him. It’s not a terrible idea.

That might just work.

*

The problem with actually starting a podcast is that it’s a lot of work, and it actually requires them having free time. Which isn’t actually something that the two of them actually have much of.

They do go and buy an extra microphone. They do figure out the logistics of what the show is going to be, what it’s gonna be called, and how they’re gonna record it. And really, it’s simple the idea. They go on a date doing something stupid and fun together, and then talk into a microphone for an hour about what they did on their date.

It takes them time, but one day in early December of 2012 they sit in the closet of their bedroom, both of them barely dressed to combat the heat of being closed in a small clothes filled closet, with Lego asleep in Liam’s lap and a pair of microphones connected to Sam’s laptop between them and a large bottle of ten year old bourbon between them .  
They're happy and drunk and they actually get to spend time together.

It’s a dumb idea, and for some reason people listen to it. And really all that means is that they have an excuse to do another episode.

*

It’s slightly before their first episode of their podcast goes out for the internet to hear that Sam brings up the two of them buying a house. It instantly sounds like a terrible idea to Liam, but still he hums along as Sam tells him about a house that he saw for sale in Burbank, and how he’s been thinking about it for a while now.

Liam knows that it’s the logical thing for the two of them to do. And really it does makes sense for them to get a house together. They’re quickly outgrowing the apartment that they live in now, and the spare bedroom has become more of a storage room than an actual room where people can sleep. But it also sounds like a terrible idea to Liam.

They’re not soulmates. This relationship isn’t gonna last forever. It’s a lie held together purely by the fact that they haven’t met anyone whose first words matched. Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates. But Liam O’Brien looks at Sam Riegel and he can’t find a reason other than they're not soulmates as to why they shouldn’t buy a house.

Their relationship is a sinking ship, and the two of them are holding on until they drown. Their relationship was doomed from the start, but yet Liam still hums along, telling Sam they should probably look into finding a real estate agent.

But yet Liam sits in a stuffy office with Sam to his left, their fingers laced, and talking to the peppy blonde woman in a pencil skirt who’s asking them what they want in a house. Both of them blink for a second, because neither of them thought more into buying a house then they won’t be stuck in their cramped apartment anymore.

It’s quiet for a second, the question washing over them. It’s Liam, and all his doubt about doing this who hesitantly answers first, quietly saying a big fenced in yard, so they could finally get the dog they’ve been talking about getting for years. It’s Sam who answers extra bedrooms so that they have room when their parents and sisters come to visit. They talk about how they want extra space somewhere in the house for an office, and maybe a recording booth. They talk about wanting a nice kitchen, open enough for them to both be in there cooking at the same time, and fireplace in the living room.

Before now, Liam hadn’t really been able to picture what their house would look like. But sitting here with Sam’s hand laced in his, describing their dream house to their real estate agent, it’s easy for Liam to picture. It’s easy for Liam to think about how they could finally get the puppy they’ve been talking about getting since before they adopted Legolas. They could have a backyard with trees and flowers for the puppy to run around in. They’d have more space for their respective families to come visit, rather than a room half filled with semi-important crap.

Liam still thinks that them buying a house is a terrible idea that will only end horribly. But he’s slowly realizing that he wants a white picket fence and a backyard lined with tall trees and colorful flowers and a puppy more than he thinks that their relationship and buying a house together will backfire.

*

Neither of them have the heart to tell the real estate agent that they're not actually soulmates. She shows them house after house with empty rooms and subtly makes hints to them they would make a good nursery. One of the houses they visit actually has a nursery set up in one of the spare bedrooms. The room has soft blue walls, a crisp white crib with clouds circling above it and the alphabet intricately painted above it on the wall in bright colors. Sam lets his hand trail across the frame of the crib as Liam and their agent talk behind him about something that Sam tunes out.

He lets himself, just for a moment day dream about a Liam sitting in the rocking chair with  
baby in his arms. Sam shakes the thought from his head as soon as it appears.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates. They don’t get to have that. They continue looking at houses, and letting their agent think that they're a couple looking for a home to start their family in.

*

It takes a few months, but they buy a house together. They get handed the keys to place at noon on a Saturday. They play rock, paper, scissors and Liam laughs at Sam attempts to carry him across the threshold, his arms wrapped tightly around the younger man’s neck. When Sam does finally get him across the doorway, Liam pulls him into a kiss and whispers into his mouth, “Welcome home, Sammy,”  
  
The house doesn’t have a white picket fence, but it does have a huge fenced in backyard with an old and tall oak tree tucked away in a corner, and it has brightly colored purple, pink, and blue flowers lining the fence, a brick front and more space than two men who will share a bedroom and an office really need. There’s an extra bedroom upstairs that they set up for their parents when they visit, and a room downstairs with glass door and is used for an office. An office that doesn’t take long for the walls to be filled with art that fans have given them over the years, and never really had a place to display for before. Their desks are the finest of Ikea make, stacked high with papers and scripts and various notes about various jobs, as well as various trinkets of characters they’ve played over the years.

It has a nice kitchen with wooden cabinets that their dishes and mugs don’t come close to filling up. There is a wood burning fireplace with a mantel that fill with pictures of their families, and the center picture is one of Sam and Liam with Lego perched on Liam’s lap. The house becomes a perfect blend of the two of them. A mix of nick-nacks that fill empty spaces and art and picture filling the wall. They buy an oversized cat tree and a king sized bed just because they could.

Neither of them talk about the empty room two doors down from their bedroom that their realtor had smiled at and described as a room that would make a good nursery. A room that both of them stepped into and saw exactly what she meant. They both saw the other silhouetted by the setting sun with a tiny version of them rocking them back to sleep at night.

They don’t touch that room, and both of them know why. They don’t talk about it.

That’s not something that they get to have.  
Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates.

Kids would be a terrible idea. (Neither of them stop thinking about it though.)

*

Somewhere in the midst buying a house and starting a podcast, they get invited to join a Dungeons and Dragon game by Matthew Mercer. Or well, more accurately Matthew Mercer offers to run a game for Liam sometime in the midst of recording Resident Evil, and he drags a reluctant Sam along. They do it for the second episode of their podcast.

(“What’s the worst. Can I just be the worst,” Sam says, he’s drunk on cheap wine and the two of the are locked in the closet with Legolas fucking with the wires of their microphones between them.

Liam huffs, thinking about it for a second before saying “You can be like a gnome,”)

They spent a day with a group of work friends, and play a game of Dungeons and Dragons. They know all of these people in one way or another. Liam knows Matthew Mercer from work; they’ve both been working with Taliesin since they were living in New York. Neither of them have ever met Marisha before. Out of everyone they know Laura and Travis best. It’s enough that they don’t consider them work friends, enough that the two of them had been invited to Laura and Travis’ wedding.

Not that any of them of them know it yet, but this is the start of their little found family. The start of a group of people, a family, who are bound together by ink on their skin that isn’t the one they were born with. That first game is magical, and exciting, and all of them are hooked on the drug of DnD. Matthew Mercer is a fantastic Dungeon Master, and Sam Riegel doesn’t know why he’s never played before. It’s everything that he loves about being a performer.

The next day Liam O’Brien asks if they're going to play again. It takes them a moment to all answer, but they all say yes.

(Somewhere down the line they pick up Ashley Johnson, and she’s the perfect final addition to their little found family)

*

The two of them finally get their puppy in the late summer of 2013. It’s after they're mostly settled into their new house, all of the boxes mostly unpacked and have a weekend free to spend at an adoption event in the suburbs of Los Angeles. It is a packed event, a large crowd of people filtering between the different tables of the event. There are hundreds of dogs, some being walked by their owners, and some in large metal cages rested on tables with little plastic cards about their names.

The two of them spend most of their day filtering from table to table, asking about dogs, petting some, and being able to hold some. None of the dogs really catch their eye.

It’s the last table that they go to. The sun slowly fading from the orange and red sky, meaning that it’s only a matter of time before the darkness of night sets in.

The last table had mostly older dogs, quite a few empty cages with laminated blocky letters saying “Adopted” hanging on the front, and a pair of puppies. It’s Liam who stops in front of the pair of small puppies, while Sam was in the mists of a conversation with one of the people running the booth.

The two puppies were about the same size, and passed out cold in their shared cage. One of the dogs was all white, and looked to be mostly fur. The other dog was mostly white with gray and brown spots filling its back and brown fur framing its face. The plastic card on their shared cage says both of them are about six or seven weeks old.

It also lists the all white one as a Great Pyrenees Mountain dog, and the other as Australian Shepherd.

One of the other people working the booth comes over to him, and starts talking to him about their adoption process. Liam kind of feels bad for tuning him out, but this is what Sam is currently having a conversation about not even five feet away from him. So he spends the conversation nodding along, and picking up some of the things that they’re saying to him. The man talks about how they can go home with their new four legged friend today, and what their adoption fees were.

The man was maybe half way threw his spiel when Sam returned to his side, pressing a kiss down into the side of his forehead, and their finger locking together. Silently Liam pointed at the pair of sleeping puppies. The man must have finished his spiel of information, or realized that Sam already got all of the information from the other worker.

“We’re trying to get those two adopted out together. They both were left at our shelter on the same day about three weeks ago and have been inseparable ever since,” the man said to them as Sam and Liam shared a look with one another.

It was Sam who smiled back at the man and asked if they could pet both. The worker smiled back, and guided the two of them into a small fence that definitely was meant to be okay sized for children to pet the animals, but was barely big enough for two men both about six feet tall.

The puppies were both small and while the Pyrenees was bigger, most of him was fur. The man continued telling them that both of these dogs were going to be on the bigger size. “The Pyrenees,” he said to them, still smiling, “will easily be over a hundred pounds and the Aussie will be close to 60 or 70.”

They both hummed at that. They wanted a big dog, something large to run with Liam as he jogs around their neighborhood, a large dog to cuddle with, and run around their large backyard chasing after balls and sticks.

They switch dogs after a minute or two of letting their fingers run through the soft fur of the dog that was placed on their laps. Both dogs barely awake, and content with the two petting them and the attention that they’re currently receiving.

There is something that Liam feels looking at Sam with the fluffy ball of a dog in his lap. Something that he has felt before, the first time that he saw Sam holding Legolas like a baby, talking softly to her as he moved through their kitchen making her dinner. A feeling that Sam felt looking at Liam at the animal shelter smiling down at Legolas when they met her for the first time.

It’s Sam who asks, “Do you know if the two of them are good with cats?”

The worker smiles and tells them that the two of them are currently being fostered in a home with two cats. They share another look as they switch the dogs again. The two puppies are starting to get more energy waking up from their late afternoon nap, squirming in their arms as they continue to pet them. They smile at each other, and they agree to adopt them both.

*  
Much like when they adopted Legolas, they pile the puppies in the backseat of their car and drive to PetSmart. They put both puppies in shopping cart and walk around the store putting things that they probably don’t need in the wagon around them. They drop a pack of tennis balls, and fuzzy stuffed toys that according to the tag ‘the longest lasting soft dog toy’. They buy a crate and a couple of soft blankets at the recommended of the people working in the booth at the adoption event. Both of the workers saying it’s better to crate them at night, and when alone at first.

They buy a bag of puppy food, and training treats. They buy a two sets of ceramic dishes, one set blue, the other set purple, and both with little bones lining the inside.

They fill the cart up around the dogs, and as their walking to check up Sam picks up a little stuffed mouse. Liam is pretty sure that Legolas already has the same toy in three separate colors from the one Sam tossed in the cart, but Liam doesn’t say anything about how they're there for their still unnamed puppies. Liam had already grabbed a feather toy for Legolas as well, so really who was he to judge.

They buy collars in two different colors, one purple and the other soft blue, and jangling name tags that doesn’t have a name, but the address of their house carefully engraved into the small piece of metal.

*

They spend the better part of a week going back and forth between names. A week where they watch Legolas slowly adjust to no longer being an only pet child and the reality of them having two dogs always being around. Where they saw both puppies grow more and grow more adjusted to living with them. A week where they saw both puppies run with energy that neither of them thought they could have around their backyard returning to them mud covered and smiling their doggy smiles.

A week were Liam and Sam threw names at each other trying to figure out what they should be called. They do settle eventually. They both told the other that they had to have a name for both of the dogs before their first vet visit with the pair one week after their adoption.

The night before, on a whim Liam says, “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.”

Both of them blink at that, then down at the pair of puppies as their nails click on the hardwood as the pair of them run around their feet.

Sam smiles, a toothy grin as he shook his head, before he said “It’s fitting I think,” before pulling him down into a kiss, and he continued, “So which of you two is Rosencrantz and which of you is Guildenstern,”

Liam laughed at him reaching down and scooping up the Aussie puppy, and saying “I’m thinking that this little guy is Guildenstern. What do you think Sammy?”

Sam reaches out sritching behind Guildenstern’s ear, he smiles again before saying “Hello there Guildenstern,” then reaching down and grabbing the quickly growing Pyrenees, and lifting him up and continuing, “and hello there Rosencrantz,”

Liam smiles and whispers, quietly enough that Sam has to strain to hear it, even standing close together, just the newly named pair of dogs between them, “Welcome to our Family.”

*

The DnD group was in its 3rd session, close to three months after that first game when Sam realized that he doesn’t think that any of the people in this game actually know that him and Liam aren’t soulmates. Taliesin might know, but they only worked with him a few times in New York and most of those times were before they met each other.

But sitting here after six or seven hours of playing, plopped down in the seat next to Liam, the older man leaning heavily against him, Sam realizes that he’s not sure if he wants them to know about the fact that they’re not actually soulmates.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates, but the fewer people who know they aren’t, the easier it is to lie about them actually being paired.

*

Liam realizes that none of their soon to be little found family know about him and Sam’s lack of matching words close to a year after they all start playing together. He had invited Laura over for lunch one weekend in early December were Travis and Sam were both out of town for one reason or another.

He remembers the moment of Laura sitting across from him in their backyard talking about their lives, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern now both large and just about fully grown chasing each other around the yard as they did. The conversation was easy, and light. Just two friends smiling and laughing at each others stories and eventually Laura had asked him, “Why aren’t you and Sam married?”

Liam blinked a couple of times, his eyes darting down to his hand, bare of any rings and Liam lets out a sigh, deep and thought filled, “Sometimes,” he had said, slow and softly, “I wish that we were, but you know,”

“Then why not propose to him? You don’t need Sam to propose to you to get married,” Liam blinked a couple of times. That’s not what he was expecting Laura to say to him.

He would propose to Sam in a heartbeat if he could.

“That’s not… We can’t, Laura,” Liam can feeling the heavyweight settling back in his chest. Pressure and regret and wanting of things he can’t have. (An empty bedroom next to their room that would make a perfect nursery, a ring pop still tucked away in their kitchen cabinets)

“What do you mean you can’t, Liam? Of course you and Sam can get married,” Laura’s eyes narrow clearly confused about what she’s being told by Liam. Liam doesn’t want to have this conversation. His eyes squeezed shut and he ducked his head down to avoid a conversation that he can’t avoid.

“We’re not, we can’t, I… I can’t Laura,” he can feel the tears building up behind his closed eyes. Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates. They don’t get to live happily ever after. Everything around him, the blissful little life of a house with a big backyard with an oak tree and three lovely pets that they easily call their children won’t last.

Laura’s hands reach out and grab at his face, one hand on either cheek. “Liam there’s no reason that you and Sam can’t get married. It’s not strange or weird for Soulmates to marry.”

Liam lets out a choked sob, and he can feel one of dogs brushing against his legs. “But we’re not,” is all he said to her in return. He opened his eyes, gaze still trained down, Rosencrantz is at his feet, his white fluffy head resting on Liam’s lap. He lets his fingers run through the fur, as the tears now freely run down his cheeks.

“Oh,” Laura’s thumbs wiped at the tears and said, “That shouldn’t matter either Liam. Look at this life you two have. A life you two built without divine intervention.” One of her hands leaves his face, and he feels one of her fingers tap at the words pressed into his collarbone “If you want to get married, your words shouldn’t be what’s stopping you.”

Liam continues to sob into Laura, silent tears falling down his cheeks, and whispers softly, “I wish it was that easy,” Guildenstern has come close now, moving around his larger brother to lick at Liam’s hands.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t Soulmates. There isn’t even a chance that this relationship could end up working in the long term. As much as Liam hates to admit it, even crying into Laura Bailey’s arms about how he wants to marry Sam, and how they can’t.

Their relationship was doomed from the start. There isn’t any changing that.

*

Time passes like in a blur of their busy lives, falling into bed with one another, making memories they hope they don’t forget, playing Dungeons and Dragons once or so a month and the dogs steadily growing larger and larger.

A year passes and it’s 2014. Liam starts feeling like shit constantly. His ears hurt, his head hurts, his heart hurts. He’s spiralling, hard and fast. He doesn’t know how to fix it either. Just spiralling in pain, and he doesn’t know what to do.

There is one day where his ears hurt so bad that he doesn’t get out of bed. He spends most of the day sleeping. In fact, he wakes up to the sky dark, and Sam’s hand on the side of his face, kneeling next to the bed.

“Are you okay?” He whispers, and Liam just reaches for him, letting himself be wrapped up into Sam’s arms, feeling tears form in his eyes and finally breaking down. He’s not okay, and he doesn’t know how to fix it.

He’s not okay. He’s in pain, his heart hurts more and more each day. He’s not okay, and a much as Sam tries he hurts. Sam doesn’t help. Sam tries, simple things like breakfast in bed, small little trinkets just to make him smile. He tries small surprises of presents, and donuts, and paperback books. Liam still crashes and burns.

(He appreciates everything Sam does just to try and get him to smile, even if he can’t quite smile.)

No one knows why his ears hurt. On top of that, nothing else in his life is okay. Sam tried. He let Liam be when he wanted to be alone. He took time off and followed him back to New Jersey whenever he could. He held Liam when he cried, and whisper to him promises that will surely not be kept.

(Pressed together in bed in his childhood room, Liam was silent, he wanted to cry, but no tears came. Instead, he listened to Sam softly humming a song Liam has heard him sing a million times before.)

A weight settles in his chest, and everything is numb. Even Sam, who for so long has pulled him into his bubble of happiness, can’t help that weight. He moves through life as a series of movements and pain.

His ears hurt, working long hours screaming into a microphone, his ears hurt, a plane ride to New Jersey, his ears hurt, a plane ride to Los Angeles, his ears hurt, cry, fall into bed and struggle to leave it. Repeat.

Liam falls into Sam’s chest one day in early 2015, and he’s struggling. His hair is longer than it’s been in a long time, he’s scruffy and he feels like he’s always one step away from crying. He falls into Sam, and Sam holds on to him tight.

“Why are you still here?” It’s a soft whisper into Sam’s neck. It’s full of pain and emotion. Liam is scared, and sad, and he doesn’t want to lose this. The younger man’s hands still on his back, and he can feel Sam frown into his hair.

“Because I love you, honey,” is what Sam responds with. Liam knows that Sam loves him. He knows that. Depression is a funny thing though.

“Why?” is all Liam replied with. Sam squeezes Liam closer with a kiss pressed to the top of his head.

“Because I love your smile, and your laugh.” Liam huffs into Sam, and Sam softly laugh and continued, “No really, you care about me. You listen to me when I talk, you let do the stupid things I do, and you always laugh at it. It’s the way you softly smile at Lego when she does something funny. Or how you make sure that both Rosencrantz and Guildenstern both get equal shares of everything.”

Sam continues, softly listing everything that he loves about him. Little things and big things, and everything in between. Sam fills the silence of their bedroom with reasons why he’s still here, holding on to Liam tight, and the reasons why he won’t leave until Liam tells him. After awhile of Sam’s voice filled with emotion still listing reasons, Liam turns and grabs at his arm. Sam lets the movement happens, and he watches the blonde slowly lets his fingers trace over the deep black ink permanently marking his skin.

“I’m not your soulmate, though,” Sam smiles as Liam palm presses into the words, hiding them from the world.

“I know, honey, and I know that matters to you,” the arm that doesn’t have his words on it moves and turns Liam’s head pressing a soft kiss to his lips, “But it doesn’t matter to me, Liam; as long as you’ll have me like this, I’ll stay.”

Liam drops his head back into Sam’s chest and into a mouth full of fabric said, “I don’t want you to go.”

“Then I won’t leave.”

Liam isn’t happy. He’s not okay in anyway. His ears hurt and no one knows why. He has a trip to New Jersey that weekend and he just feels heavy.

Sam’s reassurance doesn’t make everything magically okay. It doesn’t make him less sad, or less in pain. It’s a nice reminder that this glass house of a relationship isn’t fake. It’s real emotions and real memories that will always be theirs to hold on to.

*

Geek and Sundry comes to them about streaming their Dungeons and Dragons game. It makes no sense. Who would want to watch a bunch of nerdy voice actors sit around a table and play DnD. They fight to keep the game the same. So that nothing changes, so it’s still just their little group of friends sitting around a table and playing a game.

And that’s what Critical Role is. A show about their little found family sitting around a table, or well at the start, multiple tables playing a game of Dungeons and Dragons. Much to their surprise, a lot of people start following the story of a bunch of Shits named Vox Machina.

*

Things for Liam get worse in some ways and in other ways they get better. They eventually figure out what’s going on with his ears, but other things decline. His hair gets longer, he’s still scruffy. But things do get easier. He gets to see his family weekly now. Thursday nights carved out of their schedule for all of them to be together.

Some days, he would press a kiss into Sam’s mouth thanking him for still being with him. Liam whispering into the younger man’s mouth his thanks for sticking by his side, for always being there for him.

And every time Liam does, he’ll answers with a soft smile, and pulling Liam into a hug. “I love you,” he’ll whisper back every time. A soft reminder that Sam is there for him.

He continues to move through life. Life still mostly sucks for him. He’s overworked, and is always busy. He’s depressed and his ears hurt way less. He finds a therapist, and talks about his problems. It helps. Sam still does little things just to see him smile, and eventually he starts to smile when he’s presented with the small little trinkets that his partner brings to him.

He starts to smile more and more. He’s not okay. But he’s better and really that’s all that matters.

*

There’s one day where he stands in front of the mirror in his and Sam’s bathroom. He runs his fingers through the long locks on his head and then across the roughness of the stubble on his face. He looks at himself and picks up his razor.

Sam finds Liam staring at himself clean shaven, and running his fingers through his long blonde locks. Sam’s arms wrap around his waist, and his chin rests on his shoulder.

“You shaved.”

Liam hums in agreement, and runs his hands through his hair again. It’s longer than he’s ever let it get before. The blond hair curls along the back of his neck, almost touching his shoulders, “My hair has gotten long.”

“It has.”

Liam runs his fingers through his hair again, pushing the locks out of his face, “Do you like it, Sammy?”

“Do you?”

Liam hums, and thinks about it for a second. He leaned back against Sam, letting the younger man mostly support him, turning his head to let press a kiss against his stubble. Liam turns his head back and looks at himself in the mirror. His hair is long, the soft curls pressing against his neck, and trying it’s hardest to fall back into his face, despite Liam’s multiple attempts of pushing it out of the way. He lets the silence sit for a moment before he said, “I think I need a haircut.”

Liam watches as Sam smiles in the mirror, and pressed a kiss into the corner of Liam’s mouth and whispered, “Okay.”

*

There’s a Wednesday afternoon roughly a year and half into streaming their game that Sam goes into the empty room in their house. They’ve been living here for almost five years now, the rest of the house well loved and filled with things that it make it theirs. The walls painted soft colors, dog and cat toys scattered across the hardwood down stairs, and pictures hanging on the walls. But this room is still as bare as the day they bought it. The walls still white, and still nothing in it.

Sam goes into the empty room and sits in the center of the emptiness. He lets the silence of the room wash over him, thinking about what this room could be. He lets his imagination show him Liam sitting in a rocking chair, holding a little baby, a white crib and powder blue walls.

Eventually Lego comes in, stretching out in the patch of sun on the carpet. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern aren’t far behind her. Both dropping down in front of Sam looking for attention.

The room is still empty, but it’s still just as easy as it was five years ago for Sam to imagine the room as a nursery.

*

Sam sits on it for a couple of weeks. He looks into how adoption would work for them. If non-soulmated couples could even adopt. They can. There isn’t a law against it. There is, however, a high probably that’ll it will take time.

He brings it up to Liam in late 2016. He pulls Liam into the empty room, and they stand facing each other in the fading sun coming through the window, Sam grabs Liam’s hands and says, “What if we adopted a kid?”

Much like the last time Sam asked him a life changing question, Liam freezes. It’s not panic that washes over him, it’s not dread. It’s fear.

Liam O’Brien wants that. A little human who is their child. A little child who calls him Dad and Sam Papa. A little child who laughs at their silly voices and they can teach Dungeons and Dragons to.

Liam O’Brien wants a life where they can be parents together. He wants it so bad that it hurts. The sun reflects off of the ring that Sam has worn around his neck everyday for over six years. Liam’s chest is heavy, and he reaches out moving the ring between his forefinger and thumb, “It’s… Sammy, that’s a terrible idea.”

“Is it though, Liam you would be amazing father, and...”

“But it’s not gonna last. We’d be dooming that kid to being a kid of a broken home,” Sam’s hands move, taking Liam’s face between his palms. Their foreheads touch together, and Liam continues to fiddle with the ring, feeling the pattern on the metal across his finger tips.

“Liam, honey,” Sam’s thumbs move across his cheeks, his voice quiet, and filled with sadness, “We don’t have to leave each other when we meet our soulmates. I love you, and I want to spend forever with you.”  
Liam feel the tears escaping, and he drops Sam’s ring, wrapping his arms around his neck. He doesn’t say anything for a moment. Just cries into Sam, the empty room around them silent. “We can’t, Sammy.”

“Liam, come on, look at me sweetheart,” Sam adjusts the older man so that his hands are back on his face, looking him dead in the eye: “Liam, what do you want. Forget about the words, forget about soulmates just for a moment. What do you want?”

Liam O’Brien knows exactly what he wants. He wants a world where he isn’t lying when he introduces Sam as his husband and his soulmate. He wants a world where he and Sam can adopt kids together and not worry about their relationship falling apart.

He wants to love Sam Riegel and not be told that his relationship is a lie. He wants to have a family with Sam. A family with Sam, and Legolas, and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, and a gaggle of children. He wants to wake up the house busy with children’s laughs and their pets’ paws on hardwood.

“I want to have a family with you,” is what Liam says to Sam after a moment.

“Okay, then let’s start a family,” Liam starts shaking his head. They can’t. You can’t always have what you want. He, they can’t have what he wants. It won’t work.

“We can’t.”

“Can you tell me a reason?”

“We’re not soulmates.”

Sam smiles softly. It’s a sad smile, no teeth and his eyes sad, “Can you tell me another?”

Liam’s breath is heavy as Sam’s thumbs wipe his tears away. He’s still shaking his head and he whispers, almost like he doesn’t want to say it, “We’re… our relationship is only temporary. One of us is gonna meet our soulmate, and then we’ll have to break up.”

Sam pulls Liam into his chest, and burying his face into Liam’s hair, “Forever Liam, I’ll stay with you until you tell me to leave, even if we meet our soulmates.”

“Promise?”

“I promise Liam, Forever,” they stand there for a moment in the silence of the empty room, Liam quietly sobbing into Sam’s chest, and Sam holding him close. After a minute, the younger man whispers, “How long have we’ve been together?”

“15 years,” he whispers into a mouth full of fabric.

“See, that’s not temporary,” Liam lets out a wet laugh into the fabric, “will you think about it?”

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates. They shouldn’t get a happily ever after. They shouldn’t get find a forever together, and adopting children together would end messily with tears, and broken hearts.

Still, despite them not being soulmates, despite them not going to last forever. Liam O’Brien nods into Sam’s chest.

*

A month and a half later, in the second week of 2017, Liam comes home from work and drops the forms for adoption on the kitchen table in front of Sam.

They fill out the paperwork with the low hum of music coming from the speaker in the next room, and the sound of nails clacking on the floor.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates, but slowly Liam is realizing that they might have a chance at being each other’s forever.

*

Time passes, a month then two. They have multiple interviews and a home inspection. They fill out more paperwork, and eventually they get denied for adoption.

They fall into each other and cry.

They try a second time, pushing for a reason. The two of them are not given one the second time their denied either. Not a real reason, but the two of them aren’t stupid. They can read between the empty lines of they can’t adopt because of the words written on to their skin.

They try for approval to at least foster children and are denied again.

They don’t fall into each other this time, they fall away from each other. They avoid each other, working just a bit later than they should, saying yes to lunch and dinner meetings; they avoid each other so they don’t have to talk about it.

It comes crashing back to them on a Thursday morning. It’s cold, not just in temperature, as they circle around each other. It’s a different dance then the one they normally do when their circling each other making food. Their fingers don’t brush, they don’t lean into each other’s space to steal food.

It comes crashing down with a literal crash in the form of a coffee mug crashing to the ground and shattering against the tiled floor. The pretending stops. The quiet stops.

They’re both angry, but have no one to be angry at but the other. They yell at each other because there isn’t anyone else to yell at.

“This just shows that I was right, this is only temporary and…”

“How many times to I have to say that I’m not leaving, that…”

“But you’re gonna; someone out there is gonna crash into your life, and take you away from me, from this,” he gestured to the room around him, “Everything that we’ve built will all have been for nothing.”

“My soulmate would have to drag me away kicking and screaming.”

“You say that now.”

It’s almost 16 years of anger, worries and fears crashing down on them at once. It’s almost 16 years of Sam wishing Liam understood how much he loves him. Wishing Liam understood that this is it for him. It’s almost 16 years of Liam wanting this so bad that it hurts, and worrying that he’s going to lose his best friend one day.

It’s all this time that Liam has known that he wants Sam to be his forever, but knowing that it won’t work.

Everything crashes in on them.

“Liam, I don’t want anyone else, I want you.”

Liam huffs, “You say that now.”

Sam shakes his head, “I really just wish you’d take a fucking moment to open your eyes and look around you. Look at what we have here, look at _our _dogs and _our _cat. Look at _our house._” Liam is shaking his head now. They don’t get this. They don’t get to have this. “Liam I fucking love you, and sometimes I wish you take your head out of your ass and realize that sometime the universe is fucking wrong, and what ever our words say, doesn’t fucking matter!”

“But it fucking does Sam, it’s not as simple as I love you so I spend forever with you…”

“But it can be.”

“No it can’t.”

“Liam, it can. Plenty of people marry people who don’t share words.”

“And how many of them ended up divorcing because one of them meets their soulmate. I don’t want to lose you, Sammy. You’re my best friend, and I can’t lose that, Sammy.”

“Forever Liam, I promised you forever. Forever doesn’t just mean until I meet my soulmate. I don’t give a fuck who my soulmate is. I want _you_.”

For a long time, they both knew what they wanted. They both knew they wanted the other. They both wanted this life they’ve spent nearly sixteen years building with the other. Somewhere along the line in their second apartment together, watching Sam wash dishes humming to himself, Liam realized that he could never fully have this. That even though he loves Sam more than anything else he can imagine, it will never be fully real. That it will never truly be permanent.

Somewhere along the line Sam Riegel looked at Liam O’Brien holding up a fluffy white kitten and realized that he doesn’t care. That he loved Liam more than anything else. That it didn’t matter who his soulmate was, because he wants Liam.

They’re two people who aren’t soulmates, but feel in love anyway. Two people who, standing in the kitchen of their house amongst broken shards of ceramic and spilled coffee on the tile between them look at each other and Liam realizes that he doesn’t want this.

He doesn’t want them to fall apart. He doesn’t want to walk away. He realizes that he is not going to lose this. For the first time since Sam Riegel looked at him and said forever, he realizes that Sam means it. He realizes that Sam doesn’t just put on a mask and love Liam because it’s convenient, or because he’s waiting for someone else.

Sam Riegel tells Liam forever whenever doubt creeps into his brain. He tells Liam forever between kisses and through tears and for the first with the two of them yelling at each other because they’re angry at the world, and realizes that Sam actually means it.

Liam doesn’t realize he crying until Sam takes a step towards him, carefully moving around the shattered mugs, and wiping at Liam’s tears with his thumbs. “Hey,” his voice softer now, no more yelling, “Are you okay, Li?”

Liam nods, then takes a step into Sam’s arms, and into his sleep shirt says, “Will you still promise me forever tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow and everyday after.”

“Do you love me?”

“I do, with all my heart.”

“Well,” Liam said, relaxing into Sam, “I love you with all of mine.”

Sam laughs, and everything returns to mostly being normal. Liam doesn’t feel that heavy weight in his chest that he used to; he doesn’t feel the panic when they talk about their future. Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates, and the two of them don’t give any fucks that they’re not meant to live happily ever after together.

They found it in each other anyway.

*

Life continues. Nothing really changes. No one really noticed that anything has changed. But to them, it feels like all the pressure and the worry that this is gonna come crashing down is gone.

All that is left is happiness and bliss.

*

Vox Machina’s story comes to a close on a Thursday night in Mid October. It comes to an end with tears and great big battle. Vecna tried to leave, teleport away and start the battle anew another time and Vox Machina’s story comes to an end with a ninth level counterspell.

Sam Riegel looks at Matt Mercer, looks at his family around him and casts a ninth level counterspell. It comes to an end with a whisper that that spell was gonna save Vax.

Sam breaks down in tears, and Liam can’t do anything from across the table. All he can do is watch, he can watch Sam scrub at his eyes, and mouth back an I love you just for the two of them.

(They're on the internet; of course it’s not for just the two of them.)

Liam watches as Sam’s finger scrubs at the words plan as day showing on his skin, leaving faint red marks. It’s angry. Looks at the words and frowns. Liam’s fingers ghost over his unwanted words.

Liam can watch Sam angrily scrub at his words, still a fraction of a second away from crying. He can’t do anything.

An hour later, Sam folds into Liam, the skin around his words an angry red from scratching. Liam pulls Sam into a soft kiss, his fingers wrapping around his forearm.

“I love you,” is all Liam says to him. A whisper just for the two of them to hear in the loudness of the Geek and Sundry studio.

“I love you too, Liam,” there are tears in Sam’s eyes again, his fingers tracing over Liam’s words, “I’m sorry I couldn’t be better.”

“Don’t blame yourself Sammy, it’s fine.”

His fingers tap against the words barely peeking out from under the collar of Liam’s shirt, “I guess I’ll never live up to what’s planned.”

“Sam,” Liam pulls Sam closer, and lets out a shaky breath, “I love you; you’re perfect.”

They have this bliss. This relationship where they both know that this is it for them. But there are still moments, pockets of time where there is doubt that creeps into their mind. In those moments they fall into each other, pulling each other close and whispering words of reassurance to each other. On nights like tonight, where everything is heavy and the two of them just want each other, and comfort, they’ll fall into bed with each other. Just like the do on every other night, but on nights like tonight it’s about comfort. They’ll let their dogs climb on the foot of the bed, they’ll wear soft clothes, and press close to each other.

This is their forever. They won this ending, just like Vox Machina.

*

“Hey Sammy, knock knock,”

“Who's there?”

“Juno,”

“Juno who?”

“Juno I love you right?”

Sam smiles and lets out a soft laugh escaping despite his better judgement, and pulls Liam up into a kiss. “I love you too.”

*

There is a ring store that Liam passes fairly regularly. One that he walks into one Saturday afternoon, and stares at rings. He spends more time than he wants to admit in the store looking for the right ring to get for Sam. Eventually, he finds the right one. It’s simple and durable. It’s not a ring that will get in the way of anything he does. It’s a deep black metal, with etched out details around the band, and on the inside the engraving simply reads “Forever.”

He leaves the store with a little black box, and on his way home he stops at a convenience store and buys a bright blue ring pop and it goes into his pocket. The yellow wrapping crinkles in his pocket as it moves around next to the small fabric black box.

*  
Liam proposes to Sam on a Sunday Night. It’s not anything special. It’s the two of them pressed together on the couch together in just their pajamas, Legolas spread across the back of the couch, and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern asleep on the floor at their feet. It’s nice to have time like this. Just them and their pets. He lets out a laugh as Sam dies in the video game their currently playing co-op together. His controller drops to his lap, pulling Sam into a kiss and whispering softly, “Marry me?”

This time, this time neither of them freeze. Neither of them cry tears that aren’t tears of happiness. This time Sam smiles into the kiss as Liam fumbles with the pocket of his pants, pulling out both the Ring Rop and the black box, his hands shaking. Sam pulls back, letting their foreheads press together, as he does, his hands reach out and hold on to Liam’s steadying them for him. “Marry me?” he whispers again.

This time instead of panic, Sam smiles softly and whispers back “Of course.”

This time Liam pushes the ring on Sam’s finger, and Sam smiles holding his hand up to look at the ring.

“Should we post a cheesy just got engaged picture,” Sam said the corner of his mouth turned up, and his voice light, filled with happiness. Liam laughs out a maybe before pulling at Sam in the direction of their bedroom to properly celebrate their new engagement.

*

Later that night, when they're pressed skin to skin, naked and enjoying the post orgasm bliss. Sam’s new ring clicks against his necklace. The two metal rings softly clicking against Sam moves to fiddle with. A nervous habit that he’s picked up somewhere in the six years that he’s been wearing around his neck. “What’s the matter,” Liam mouths into the skin on his back.

“I bought this for ya know,” his fingers wrapping around the ring, and the older man freezes, his hands stilling and him inhaling a sharp breath.

“You did?” Sam hums, before dropping the ring back down to his bare chest. He turns in Liam’s arms so that the two of them are facing each other. He presses a kiss into Liam, before reaching up and taking the necklace off of his neck.

“I think you should have it,” Liam blinks, slowly letting Sam pull at his arm to get to his left hand, and pushing at the ring. In the dim light of their room, he looks down at the platinum ring. Simple, with pretty designs and something that won’t get in the way when he’s doing things.

“This is your ring though,” Sam smiles and pressed a soft kiss against his lips, then against the ring on his finger.

“It was yours first, I was just it’s keeper.”

(They do end up posting an engagement photo on instagram. Their hands stack on top of each other so that you see their two rings clicking together, and shining in the light.)

*

“Hey Liam, knock, knock,”

“Who’s there?”

“Anime who?

“Are you from Japan? Cause you got anime-zing body,”

Liam shakes his head, with a slight smile on his face, pulling Sam into a kiss, “Do you want to see more of this anime-zing body?” Sam nods, laughing as Liam pulls him in the direction of their bedroom.

*

The two of them organize a charity fundraiser for an organization that fights for the right for non-soulmated couples to adopt. With the help of the critters they raise money. They don’t talk about how they were denied. They don’t talk about how they're not soulmates. They don’t want their bliss to be ruined by people on twitter. Instead they raise money, Sam and Liam join run a game of dungeons and dragons as a reward for the critters raising money.

(There are people on the internet who talk about how soulmated couples don’t know the struggle that non-soulmated couples go through. There are fans who post things about how they shouldn’t be advocating for people who live in sin. There are people who post about how Sam and Liam, and the rest of the cast should stick to things that they understand.)

*  
  
Time passes like that. A year of soft bliss and tender moments. Moments of reassurance, love and tender moments. A year where their family starts their second campaign. A year where their family, their little found family starts talking about doing things on their own. A year where they start talking about moving on from Geek and Sundry.

Where they start talking about a revival of All Work No Play. They start talking about truly doing things outside of Geek and Sundry and animation and video games. They talk about maybe pitching Vox Machina to animation studios.

And one year to the day after Sam and Liam stand in their kitchen, angry and defeated, they sit on a panel, side by side like they always have been on panels together. They sit together on a panel in Mid April of 2018 just like first time nearly 16 years after they met.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates. They aren’t soulmates, but they don’t give one fuck. The two of them aren’t soulmates. The two of them build their own happily ever after and sitting on a panel one year of soft moments, engagements, and happiness.

One year to the day after they broke and put themselves back together as new men, a teenager who wasn’t even alive the day that they met, stepped up to the microphone at a panel and had a question for the two of them. They pressed close, Sam’s arm wrapping around Liam’s shoulder, as the kid asked his question.

“How did you know you were soulmates?”

It’s one year to the day after they broke, and Liam frowns into the microphone. He wants to be happy, and he also doesn’t want to lie.

“We aren’t,” is what the blonde said into the microphone, and the few hundred people in the room all freeze. The few hundred people in the audience freeze, but more importantly their family on stage freezes around them.

“What do you mean you aren’t soulmates,” it’s Marisha who said it. A part of both Liam and Sam both hoped they’d never have to have this conversation. That they could live in this bubble of happiness forever. They both know Laura knows, and by extension Travis probably already knew as well.

Hell of a way for their family to find this out.

“I didn’t walk up to Liam on a panel and say to him ‘uh, nothing,’ and Liam didn’t say to me, ‘Hey, you, what are you doing here.’ We aren’t soulmates, never have been.” Sam’s voice is petty. Filled with emotion.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates. They aren’t soulmates, but the teenager standing at the microphone says, “but your first words are in a scene in an anime,”

They both freeze.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates.  
They aren’t. They’ve known this for seventeen years. They’ve known that the two of them aren’t soulmates from their first seconds of conversation.

They both blink, their fingers lacing together under the table, hidden from cameras and wandering eyes.

“What do you mean?” It’s Laura who takes mercy on their empty brains. The audience murmurs in agreement; of course they're soulmates, everyone knows that they're soulmates, and yeah it was a scene in an anime.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien aren’t soulmates. They aren’t. They’ve never been. Right? Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien might be soulmates. The panel continues, and the two of them remain silent. Liam’s chin to his chest staring down at their intertwined fingers, his thumb tracing over Sam’s ring.

The fans seem to take mercy on them, letting the two of have their silence, pressed shoulder to shoulder, and fingers interlocked underneath the table as the panel continues.

Afterwards, their twitter notifications are filled with people telling that they're soulmates. Afterwards, Liam rests his face between Sam’s shoulder blades, and whispered, “Sammy,” His voice is heavy, filled with doubt, and hope, and breaking just enough that it showed that he was scared.

“I know,” Sam whispered back, softly as people filtered around them backstage of the show. They have to deal with their family. They're going to have to figure this out. Even if the people of the internet, the few hundred people sitting in this room are wrong, they still need to know.

There could be the slightest chance that they are indeed actually soulmates, and while they figured out their happily ever after. While they fought and fought and fought and finally found their happy ending. But standing here in the loudness of the backstage of a panel 16 years after the stood backstage at the Big Apple Anime Fest with a sharpie and them writing digits of their phone numbers on their forearms so they could become best friends.

Sixteen years after the two of them met sitting next to each other at a panel in New York City, they stand pressed into each other now faced with the sudden realization that they could be soulmates.

They’ve known for sixteen years that they're not soulmates, and suddenly they're met with the realization that they possibly could be something they never thought they could have with each other. Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien just might actually be soulmates.

*

Their twitter notifications continue to inform them of the fact that they're soulmates. People who have been fans since the beginning of Critical Role, people who have been their fans since before that. Fans who have become their friends over the years telling them via twitter the name of the anime, and asking how they didn’t know.

They get a name eventually. An obscure anime that neither of them actually remember being in. An obscure enough anime that they can’t find it streaming anywhere online.

It’s an obscure enough anime that they struggle to find a copy of it on DvD or VHS.

*

More time passes. They get their own studio, and start producing their own content. Critical Role gets bigger and bigger.

Months pass like that. They work on content for Critical Role and on various anime and video game jobs, and spend their free time looking for a copy of a cult classic anime that only had a limited dubbed release in America.

They live their lives as if nothing has changed. They’re happy. Happy about the lives they have, their little furry children, their well loved home.

They don’t need to know if they're actually soulmates. They’ve already found their story book ending.

It would just be nice to know.

*

In December of 2018, the two of them are in upstate New York for Christmas. They're passing through a small town picking up food for Liam’s family cabin during the time that they’re there.

They go into a used video store by chance -- the two of them were walking in the direction of the small food store when the snow started to fall heavily down around them. Even with the two of them bundled up in scarves and mittens and thick winter coats to combat the lake effect snow falling around them, it’s still coming down hard enough that they seek warmth.

The video store is old and run down with a bored teenager sitting behind the counter idly tapping at his phone. They shrug off the snow as the teenager welcomes them in, clearly surprised to see anyone in this weather. They walk through the store together hand and hand, every now and again flipping through the boxes of DVDs. It might’ve been fate, or just extremely good luck that right as the snow starts to let up and the two of them start to move towards the door to actually get their shopping done, that they find it.

A beat up box with a sticker with a price sticker on the front, and loudly proclaiming the name of the anime in English letters. They both reach for it, and they spend a bit too much money on a beat up box of DVDs for a chance at something.

*

On Christmas Eve, two nights later, the two of them fall onto the couch with one another. The surroundings of the O’Brien family cabin familiar to them, the scent of the holiday seasons and lake water washing over them. It’s familiar; they’ve been coming up here together for years. Since before they moved to Los Angeles. This Christmas they're here together. They’re here together, the two of them with three furry friends in a cabin along the New York side of the Canadian border. Sam has Legolas laying in his lap, laying on her back batting at Sam’s hand as he pets across her belly. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are both asleep on the floor in front of the couch, both still damp from running around in the snow.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” Sam rubs his hands together as he says it, his hands still faintly numb from chasing the dogs around in the snow.

“I mean, not really. But we need to know Sammy,” Their shoulders brush, and on screen flashes of bright color appear on the screen and the show starts.

An episode passes, then two. They don’t talk, their eyes intently on the screen. Sam’s voice comes escapes from a character at the end of the second episode.

After the third, Liam stands up, both dogs sitting up, their collars jingling. He starts pacing as for the fourth time the theme song rings out of the speakers.

“What if they were lying?”

It’s not like they haven’t thought about it before. It’s a real possibility that it’s not Liam that Sam talks to. It’s a real possible that they’re not soulmates. And that’s okay. They’ll be fine if they aren’t.

Sam carefully moves Lego, dropping her into the couch where Liam had vacated. He pushed himself to his feet, and stumbles over the dogs to kitchen. After a moment, he returns and grabs at Liam’s arm, and biting the cap off of the sharpie in his other hand and across the older man’s arm writes, “Having a good weekend so far?”

Liam’s fingers trace across the sharpie words as the show continues to play in the background. Sam holds the sharpie out and Liam pulls at his shirt until his collarbone is showing, slowly he writes, “Busy. But yeah, it’s been fun so far.”

Sam smiled and pulled Liam toward the couch. Liam’s back to his chest he fell back into the couch, and they continued to watch.

Another episode passes and Liam leaves his lap, moving so that they’re next to one another, pressed thigh to thigh. Their both starting to feel a sense of dread that it wasn’t true once episode 6 started. Sam reaches over as the theme song plays again and kisses Liam.

“No matter what happens here Liam, I love you.”

Liam smiles, “I know.”

Another episode passes, and Liam’s voice hasn’t made it to their ears yet. Lego has stretched across the back of the couch, softly purring into both of their ears. The dogs have vacated, and they can hear them rushing around in the next room over.

Another episode plays and there are only two more episodes from the end. Sam’s fingers are fiddling with his ring, he’s nervous, and based on the way that Liam’s fingers have been tracing across the sharpie written words for the past fifteen minutes, his partner is nervous too.

The final episode starts, and Sam turns to Liam, “It doesn’t matter, Liam, I love you and this was stupid,” Sam’s fingers run through his curls as the theme closes out for one final time,

But before Liam could even reply, a familiar voice rings out saying, “Hey, you, what are you doing here?”

There is a split second where the both of their heads snap to screen before they watch as Sam’s character, rubs the back of his head and says, “Uh, nothing.”

Their eyes stay glued to the screen as the conversation continues. The scene changes as Liam’s character lets Sam’s continue on with his business. They’re heads slowly turned back to each other. Before Liam even realizes what he’s doing, he reached forward and let his fingers trace over Sam’s words.

“I said that,” is all he says. And Sam smiles, dropping his head into Liam’s hair, and pressing a kiss there. One of Sam’s hands settles on Liam’s chest, his thumb brushing over his collar bone.

“And I said that.”

Liam pulls him into a proper kiss, soft and sweet before standing and dragging Sam with their mouths still mostly connect in the direction of their bedroom.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien are Soulmates.

*

Really it could've just been a happy accident. Really, there is a chance that wasn’t even Sam and Liam’s first interaction in an anime; it could just be the first that was released.

It could have just been a happy accident. They don’t really care. They had happily ever after, even without the an unexpected cherry on top.

*

Years later, the two of them walk through Disneyland. A little girl about five years is swinging delightfully between them, each hand grasping onto one of the adults hands, and both of them lifting her off the ground every few steps. There is a little boy resting in Sam’s arms, smaller than her, and he’s barely more than a baby. He’s half asleep in Sam’s grasp with one arm around his neck, face pillowed into Sam’s neck. There is a second little girl who’s three or four years old on Liam’s shoulders, her tiny fingers laced in the blonde locks for leverage.

All three children have Mickey Mouse ears on their head in various colors and are smiling with delight, babbling to their fathers about the colors and lights and people around them.

Sam Riegel and Liam O’Brien are soulmates. They worked hard for their happily ever after. They fought for their love, and eventually the world rewarded them after all their years together of fighting for their love.

Sam and Liam fought for their happy ending, and eventually they got it.

And the two of them, and their family, lived happily ever after.

**Author's Note:**

> Like and Comments are appreciated <3
> 
> Also Thanks to Ama, and VideoGameDoc for the beta


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